Canterlot ist Krieg!
by SuperBlackdeth666
Summary: Based on the upcoming "Rainbow Rocks" film. As The Rainbooms just start to go on their way, Flash Sentry joins an extreme band - a band so extreme that they wreak havoc off the stage, as well as on. Ultimately, the only for The Rainbooms to stop this ensemble, and save Flash, will be to beat them at their own twisted style of music...
1. The Cloven Hoof

_Shake your tail 'cause we're here to have a party tonight_

_Shake your tail, shake your tail_

_Shake your tail 'cause we're here to have a party tonight_

_Shake your tail, shake your tail_

_Shake your tail 'cause we're here to have a party tonight_

_Shake your tail, shake your tail_

_Shake your tail 'cause we're here to have a party tonight_

_Shake your tail, shake your tail_

_Shake your tail 'cause we're here to have a party tonight!_

Such was how the new up and coming pop band known as The Rainbooms capped off their first headlining show at the Cloven Hoof, a quaint little club in downtown Canterlot. It was a small venue, only tightly fitting about 100 people into the general admissions area, but for The Rainbooms - lead vocalist Twilight Sparkle, guitarist Rainbow Dash, drummer Pinkie Pie, bassist Applejack, keytarist Rarity and tambourinist Fluttershy - merely headlining a show for the first time was a milestone in and of itself. And to boot, the band played really, really well, with everyone nailing every single note in each of the songs they played; half of their set consisted of their own material, while the other half consisted of covers of songs by old rock bands such as Elvis, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd, amongst others. Plus, despite how tightly packed everyone in the audience was, they were all able to dance quite energetically to both their original pop tunes and their old rock 'n roll covers. So with all of that having transpired, as The Rainbooms capped off their finale, took their bow and retreated backstage while stage hands were dispatched to gather up the equipment, nothing but smiles and utter satisfaction showed on their faces.

Waiting for them in the backstage lounge area was arguably the band's two closet friends; Sunset Shimmer, a former supervillain who was reformed thanks to the band's efforts, and Flash Sentry, a fellow aspiring musician in his own right. As The Rainbooms all filed into the lounge as exhausted as they are thrilled, Flash and Sunset immediately got right up to greet them.

"Awesome show, girls!" commended Sunset as she and Flash both gave hugs all around. "You all look like you've really started on your way this time."

"Yeah, keep this up and you'll have a major label drooling over you in no time!" Flash replied with a wink, which made Twilight blush and Sunset cringe a bit in response.

"Well, thanks guys!" Rainbow Dash smirked. "Everyone is improving on their instruments."

"Not that we weren't good to begin with, right?" exclaimed Pinkie Pie. "Right?!"

"Yep!" affirmed Applejack.

"Uh... yeah, sure," squeaked Fluttershy.

"Actually," Flash Sentry then said, "I do have a suggestion." Immediately the band, particularly Twilight, gave him their undivided attention as he said, "As catchy as your girly pop tunes are, you maybe should try writing your own hard rock songs. Those rock covers you did were pretty cool, plus, I've seen the way Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie and Applejack have played solo; they'd probably be able to play for Ozzy Osbourne himself if he let 'em!"

"Well what about me?" Rarity then asked, obviously a bit offended over not being mentioned. "I'm a good keytarist, aren't I?"

"Of course," assured Sunset.

"But not all rock bands use keyboards, you know," Flash pointed out.

"Ozzy Osbourne does!" Rarity snapped. "Sometimes, anyway. Like on that song, 'Mr. Crowley!'"

"OK, point taken," Flash conceded. "Can we just stop the debate before it becomes a war?"

"Yeah, besides," added Sunset, "It's late, and I'm beat. I don't know about the rest of you, but as great of a show as it was, I just wanna go home and crash!"

Indeed, by this point, it was way past midnight, and The Rainbooms were starting to get just a little bit droopy-eyed. "Well," Twilight reasoned, "our gear should be back in the van by now... yeah, we really should be getting home, it's late."

With all of her friends and bandmates unanimously agreeing, the entire group trudged their way through the backstage and out of the club to their van, which had indeed been repacked with all of their instruments, amps, etc. With everyone piled in tightly, and with Twilight behind the wheel, the van crawled its way out of the parking lot, through the empty downtown streets of Canterlot, onto the freeway and from there into the subdivision where they all lived.

Flash Sentry was the first to be dropped off at his place. "Alright, see ya girls tomorrow!" he waved.

"Bye, Flash!" Twilight and Sunset both waved gleefully as Flash walked into his house...

* * *

><p>The next morning, Flash woke up early, cleaned up, got dressed and went downstairs to get his breakfast; his parents had made him bacon, eggs, butter toast and milk, all of which were already sitting on the kitchen table, ready for him to eat.<p>

"Morning, Flash," his mom greeted him. "How was the show last night?"

"Fantastic, Mom," Flash said as he dug into his breakfast.

"What about this Twilight girl?" his dad chipped in with a suggestive smirk. "Ya won her over yet, heh heh?"

"I'm, uh, still working on it," Flash blushed. "But Sunset seems like she's trying to win me back, and uh-"

"_That_ bitch?!" Flash's mom cried out in a fit. "SERIOUSLY?! She doesn't deserve to be even _talking_ to you, after how she screwed you and so many others over! You should just tell her to go screw herself and ask Twilight out, already!"

"But, Mom," Flash insisted, "she has turned herself around, and we have gotten back on good terms, and-"

"I wouldn't count on it, son," his dad warned. "But anyway," he added as he checked his watch, "the bus should be here any minute. Oh, and here's the paper, in case you should have time to kill."

"Alright, see ya guys!" With that, Flash Sentry took the newspaper, his backpack and his electric guitar and heads out the door to the street. Sure enough, the school bus arrived just as he got there, and so he got on board, ready for another day at Canterlot High School.

On the bus ride there, Flash was reading the newspaper to pass the time. Mostly, it was boring stuff regarding stocks, the weather, petty crimes, political rhetoric and other things he didn't care much for. But then, he saw something in the want ads that immediately caught his attention. The ad read;

"Lead guitarist wanted for black metal band at Canterlot High School. Must be able to play grim and frostbitten power chords and tremolo notes straight from the depths of hell! Inquire us at the music rehearsal space during lunch. BLACK METAL IST KRIEG!"

"Black metal, huh?" Flash said to himself as he began to consider this option. Though his personal favorite style of guitar music was good old classic rock, he did like to delve into other kinds as well, including various types of heavy metal. Heavy metal, of course, has a ton of different subgenres - quite possibly more so than any other type of music in the world - and black metal is known as one of the absolute most extreme of them all. Flash himself had learned a couple of songs just out of pure curiosity and for the fun of it, but other than that, he never really did get into black metal. Nonetheless, his official decision regarding this want ad was thus; "I think I might just give this black metal thing a try. Could be fun..."


	2. Bronycorpse

For Flash Sentry, the first half of the school day went by in a slow, rather boring sort of way. He had three classes before lunch; algebra, biology and history. Since algebra and biology were particularly difficult classes for Flash, he'd usually pay extra close attention in them to better his chances of just squeezing by, so to speak. But on this day, even history wasn't enough to keep him from looking forward to lunch - not because of anything special they were serving in the cafeteria, but because of the black metal band that would be holding auditions for a lead guitarist during that timeframe. For as long as Flash had played guitar, though he had gotten really good, thus far he hadn't gotten noticed by any bands that had an opening for him. And while black metal was not his favorite genre of music, he had still dabbled enough into it to get the general concept of how it was played - plus, he knew that it was best to jump at an opportunity as soon as it presented itself.

So on this day, he dozed his way through algebra and biology while somehow evading any scoldings from his teachers. History class was a bit more engaging - it always was for him - but even as Twilight Sparkle and Sunset Shimmer both winked and batted their eyelashes at him, all he could think about was the prospect of actually joining a band for the first time, finally getting the opportunity to do something bigger with his guitar, bigger than just playing around in his room with the amp not turned up to its fullest potential...

When history class was finally dismissed, Flash was the first one out as he took off on a mad dash towards the cafeteria, where he got a (very poor quality) slice of pepperoni pizza and a can of fruit juice and wolfed them down as fast as he could, not willing to waste any time - lunch breaks at school are not too long in duration, after all. But just as he turned to leave the cafeteria and head to the band room, guitar in hand, both Twilight Sparkle and Sunset Shimmer cut him off, each one eager to spend some quality time with Flash alone.

"Hey Flash, wanna share a salad?" Sunset winked.

"Her salads taste like crap!" Twilight retorted. "Wanna split a pizza? You know, just you and me...?"

"Her pizzas taste like cow patties," Sunset snapped.

"Do not!" Twilight shot back.

"Uh, actually girls," Flash spoke up, breaking up the argument. "I'm on my way to the band room right now; there's a band holding auditions for a lead guitarist, and I was hoping to try my hand with them."

"Oooooh!" Normally, Twilight and Sunset would both continue to make Flash offers to spend time with them, but the thought of him playing in a band was something the both of them had looked forward to a great deal, mainly because of the possibility of said band touring with The Rainbooms someday. "What kind of band?" they both asked eagerly.

"Uhhh..." Flash hesitated before answering, "It's a surprise," not sure about just how they'd react upon learning that he was auditioning for a black metal band. "Well, wish me luck," he answered abruptly as he turned to leave.

"Good luck!" Twilight and Sunset both replied as Flash left for the band room, totally oblivious to the heated argument that just spawned between Twilight and Sunset over who wished him luck first...

As Flash approached the band room, he heard the most ghastly, abrasive sounds coming from within. This, most certainly, was true black metal being played. Intrigued, he entered the room and saw the band - four boys about his own age, all producing the most evil-sounding tones from their instruments. The guitar screamed like a savage demon saying the Lord's prayer backwards while the bass plodded along underneath it, and the drums blasted like a barrage of gatling guns firing on an approaching enemy tank. But what really stood out above all else was the vocals. This band's singer - if he could even be called that - screamed the most blasphemous phrases he could conjure up, and with the most ghastly snarling shrieks he could expel from his diaphragm, sounding like Satan raping an ocelot in the forests of Carpathia...

"Whoa, everyones! Stops!" the singer called out upon noticing Flash Sentry's presence. The band and their instruments immediately fell silent as the singer announced in a very heavy accent, "Look like someone's interested in doings leads guitar for us."

"Uh... hi," Flash waved awkwardly. "Name's Flash Sentry. I've played guitar, uh, pretty much all my life - I admit, I don't know much about black metal, but I have played a couple of songs, and I saw your want ad in the paper and thought playing in your kind of band might be fun, so here I am."

"Well, dat's us," said the singer. "We're called Bronycorpse - sorrys, we neglecteds to mentions that in ours ad."

"Bronycorpse?" Flash asked, confused. "Okay, I know black metal bands are known for those evil-sounding names, and I know what a corpse is, but what's a "brony?"

"I... I don't knows," the singer shrugged. "Somethings to dos with growns men jackings off to picture of nakeds horse, or somethings."

"O... kay, then." Flash shrugged awkwardly. And with that, he was then gladly introduced to the individual members of the black metal band known as Bronycorpse. First, there was the lead singer, Hest Endetarm. He was originally from Norway - the black metal capital of the world - and had come to America just as he was starting high school, hence the accent. He wore a black wifebeater which revealed his ripped arms and outlined his pecs and abs, and also wore baggy black jeans and big black steel-toe boots, and sported long black hair down to his chest. Also notable was his voice, which had gotten naturally hoarse over so much time of doing the black metal screams.

Then there was Satanik Pervertor; a native-born American, like everyone else in the band except for Hest. He was the rhythm guitarist for Bronycorpse, as well as the more mellow and contemplative member of the group. Like the rest of the band, he too was insanely ripped, and he wore a straight black t-shirt coupled with blue jeans and black boots, and had long, blonde hair down to his chest. His instrument of choice was a jet black Dean Razorback - a radical jagged-shaped guitar invented by legendary guitarist Dimebag Darrel - which he ran through an amplifier consisting of a Peavey 6505 head on top of a Peavey 6505 4x12 cabinet, as well as a Boss MT-2 Metal Zone distortion pedal for that unmistakable black metal snarl.

After him, there was the bassist, a demonic (but not as demonic as Hest) figure named Tartarus. He was clad in a black leather jacket and black jeans and boots, and sported long brown hair which was also down to his chest. His preferred bass guitar was a black BC Rich Widow, quite possibly the most radical-looking axe ever manufactured with its appearance bearing a striking resemblance to that of the black widow spider that it was named for. This he ran through a bass amp that was made up of a Hartke Kilo head on top of a Hartke Hydrive 4x10 cabinet, and completing the rig was a DOD FX92 Bass Grunge distortion pedal to add that low-end growl that so many other black metal bands lack.

And finally, there was Discordia, the hulking behemoth who served as the drummer for Bronycorpse - undoubtedly the most badass of the bunch. He was wearing a black tank top which revealed his extremely buff arms - much more buff than those of the rest of the band - along with baggy blue shorts and black tennis shoes, and he too had hair down to his chest, only his was auburn in color. In his hands, he wielded a pair of Pro-Mark drumsticks, which he used to bang on the Mapex drums and Zildjian cymbals that made up his drum set - and this set was huge, about twice the size as the one Pinkie Pie used for The Rainbooms. This drum set's most striking feature was not one, but two bass drums, both 22" x 18", used to make the devastating double bass kicks that make black metal so brutal. Mounted on these bass drums were four tom tom drums, ranging in size from 8" x 7" to 13" x 10". Also included were two floor toms - one 16" x 16" and one 18" x 16", as well as a 5.5" x 14" snare drum. Then, of course, were the cymbals, all pitch black in color; two crash cymbals - one 16" and one 18" - one 22" ride cymbal, one 15" hi-hat, one 13" splash cymbal, and finally, one 18" china cymbal to cap it all off.

"So what about you?" Pervertor asked Flash. "Let me see what axe you're wielding!"

"Um, OK," Flash shrugged as he handed Pervertor his guitar case. Pervertor promptly opened the case and saw Flash's ordinary red guitar with the white pickguard. A rather unimpressive design, even with its whammy bar, but Pervertor quickly changed his mind when he noticed its pickups;

"_Three_ humbuckers?!" he gasped. "Holy crap, that's rare! What kind are they?"

"Seymour Duncan Blackout AHB-1's," Flash answered. "They're supposed to be really fit for this type of music."

"Damn right they are!" affirmed Pervertor.

"But, uh," Flash hesitated, "I... didn't bring my amp with me."

"No worries," Discordia smirked. "We've got an extra rig set up just for those who are auditioning for us today. Check it out!" And Flash saw it; a Mesa Boogie Triple Rectifier amp head on top of a Rectifier 4x12 cabinet, with a DigiTech Death Metal distortion pedal hooked up to it. Needless to say, Flash was awestruck, especially since he knew that the Triple Rectifier was rumored to be the loudest guitar amplifier in the world...

"So do you know any black metal songs?" Tartarus asked.

"I know 'Call of the Wintermoon' and 'Freezing Moon,'" answered Flash.

"'Freezing Moon's perfects!" proclaimed Hest. "Hooks your guitars up to dat amp, and let's do dis thing!"

"Sweet!" Flash grinned as he walked over towards the amp, turned it on and plugged his guitar into it. Without wasting any time, he drew his guitar pick out of his pocket - a Dunlop 2mm triangle - and assumed his position.

"Ready?" Discordia asked, to which everyone nodded. And so, with that, Discordia tapped 1-2-3-4 on the hi-hats, which led the band into "Freezing Moon," the signature song of legendary Norwegian black metal band Mayhem.

It began real slow-like, with Flash and Pervertor playing a series of long, sustained E chords, along with Flash adding in some ominous sounding notes on the three high strings, followed by a weak, but ominous-sounding arpeggio, all while the drums and bass plodded along slowly with them. For over a minute and a half, they played slowly like this... then the drums stopped for a few bars while Flash and Pervertor played a series of really fast chords...

...and then Discordia kicked into a rapid blast beat on the drums, playing a series of super-hard-hitting sixteenth notes alternating the bass and hi-hat with the snare. Flash and Pervertor played along with a series of tremolo notes in the key of E minor while Tartarus plucked his bass along with them. After a few measures of that, Hest came in with his raspy shriek, belting out these words;

_Everything here is so cold_

_Everything here is so dark_

_I remember it as from a dream_

_In the corner of this time_

_Diabolic shapes float by_

_Out from the dark_

_I remember it was here I died_

_By following the freezing moon..._

Then, following a big drum fill by Discordia, accompanied by a another long, sustained E chord, all of the instruments stopped - except for Tartarus's bass, as he plucked a series of long, slow E and F notes for a few bars before the other instruments came in playing the same thing. For well over half a minute, the band carried on playing this series of notes without Hest singing... then, he screamed these words;

_It's night again_

_Night you beautiful_

_I please my hunger_

_On living humans_

_Night of hunger_

_Follow it's call_

_Follow the freezing moon..._

And then came Flash's big moment; the guitar solo. While black metal is not known for guitar solos, this song had one that ran at close to a full minute, and contained hammer-ons, pull-offs, two-hand tapping and all the rest. But Flash nailed every single, evil-sounding note; he even added in some whammy bar to the longer, sustained notes - something that wasn't present in Mayhem's original version. So much ass Flash kicked with the solo that it seemed like his piece had only just started by the time the solo was finished and Hest came back in, snarling these words;

_Darkness is growing_

_Eternity opens_

_The cemetery lights up again_

_As in ancient times_

_Fallen souls die behind my steps_

_By following the freezing moon..._

And with that, the song sped back up into Discordia's blast beats, along with Flash, Pervertor and Tartarus's E minor key riffing... and after a few bars of that, the song was over. Flash Sentry had nailed his audition.

"You did it, Flash!" Hest, Pervertor, Tartarus and Discordia all exclaimed as they each high-fived Flash to congratulate him on a job well done.

"Wow, and I don't even know that much about black metal," Flash blushed.

"But you knows damns well hows to plays it!" Hest proclaimed. "And that solo - Eurynomous couldn'ts have dones it betters himself!"

"Who?"

"Eurynomous, the leads guitarist from Mayhems, radical Satanist... never minds. Just kneels down for us."

"Uh, not sure why that's needed, but OK," Flash shrugged as he got down onto one knee, kneeling like a squire being knighted;

With a bold smile on his face, Satanik Pervertor walked up to Flash with his guitar in hand; "Flash Sentry, by the infernal power bestowed upon me by the forces of Darkness, I dub thee," he proclaimed as he brought the neck of his guitar down gently onto Flash's shoulder, "lead guitarist of Bronycorpse!"

And then, just as this "ceremony" was complete, the bell rang, signifying the end of the lunch break and the impending start of the next classes.

"Perfect timing!" Tartarus sarcastically scoffed.

"But anyway," Pervertor said to Flash, "you don't have any plans for Saturday tomorrow, do you?"

"Uh... no."

"Excellent!" Pervertor exclaimed as he took a card out from his wallet and handed it to Flash. Meet us at that address at 10 tomorrow morning for band practice. Oh, and don't worry about your amp; we'll take care of it. It'll be there, ready when you are."

"Awesome!" Flash proclaimed. "Well, I gotta get to class. See ya guys at practice!" And he galloped his way out of the band room while the other members of Bronycorpse unplugged their instruments and turned off their amps, looking forward with much anticipation regarding the new musical heights they could reach with their new bandmate.

As for Flash himself, he was abound with nothing but sheer, absolute excitement as he bound his way towards gym class. "Wow, I can't believe I finally made it into a band! Not the kind I always saw myself in, but playing with those guys was a BLAST! Oh, it's gonna be so awesome playing with them! I can't wait to tell everyone...!"


	3. Elements of Discord

Flash Sentry was incredibly thrilled as he arrived at English class immediately following lunch. He knocked the members of the black metal band Bronycorpse dead playing "Freezing Moon" along with them - especially with how much more face-melting his guitar solo was than the original - and was, for the first time in his life, now a lead guitarist in a band. Most certainly not the type of band that he had always envisioned himself playing in, but still a kickass bunch nonetheless, and certainly quite a thrill to play for; a thrill that Flash was greatly anticipating for a long, long time.

Shortly after Flash took his seat in class, Twilight Sparkle and Sunset Shimmer took their seats near him, simultaneously asking "So, how'd it go?" Wary as he was of the fact that the both of them could start fighting over him at any moment, Flash just said, "Uh, great. I, uh, got in the band!"

"Ooh, yay! Congrats!" Sunset and Twilight both squeed as they hugged Flash on both sides.

"Hey, I hugged him first!" Sunset snapped at Twilight.

"No, I did!" Twilight snapped back. "And besides, you blew it with him before, so-"

"Girls! Flash suddenly butted in. The teacher's here!" Surely enough, the teacher had returned from the lounge with his signature intimidating demeanor and hypnotic stare, which were more than enough to shut Twilight and Sunset up, and to – albeit only temporarily – delay their quarrel over which one should claim Flash as her girlfriend…

So English class went uneventful as ever, as did gym class. But then came the final class of the day, and Flash's personal favorite; band. Not only did he get to play on his guitar, but he also got a temporary break from the girls fighting over him. The band in question was a typical school jazz band, with five saxophones, five trumpets, four trombones, two drums, a piano, a double bass and his electric guitar – not something your average American teenager would fawn over. Flash, though more of a rocker-type, still had (albeit to varying extents) respect for all music with guitar in it, including jazz – if, for no other reason, the fact that a number of rock and metal artists had drawn influence from jazz and blues and classical and the like. So that was how he spent the last portion of his day, playing numerous old jazz tunes from the 20's, adding some rock and metal-influenced licks into the mix, and thus earning applause from the rest of the groups and the instructor. And then finally, the day was done, so Flash packed his stuff, left the building and boarded the bus for the ride home…

After dealing with relentless flirting from Twilight Sparkle and Sunset Shimmer, as well as their quarreling, Flash finally arrived at his house, where he staggered in, relieved to be away from the girls for a day. Nearby was Flash's mother in the living room, watching TV. "Hi Flash, how'd it go?"

"Well," Flash answered, "it turned out that there was a band in the school that were holding auditions for a lead guitarist, and-"

"Oh my God, you're in a band now?!" Flash's mother exclaimed as she hopped up from the couch excitedly.

"Uhhh… yeah. How'd you know?"

"I just knew my big man would make it in someday, that's all," his mom winked as he walked up to hug him. "Oh, congratulations, honey!" she said as she added a kiss to the cheek.

"Uh, thanks, Mom."

"So, what's the deal with this band, anyway? What's going on with them?"

"Well, I do have my rehearsal with them tomorrow… actually, Mom, I do have some homework that I would like to get done before then."

"Oh yes, absolutely! That always comes first!" So Flash went into his room, did his homework, and spent the rest of the day playing guitar and video games; that was how he killed time before retiring for bed. He almost couldn't sleep that night, what with the excitement of his first rehearsal with Bronycorpse tomorrow, but he managed…

The next day, Flash woke up early – though it was a Saturday, he had always been an early bird anyway – showered, dressed, had breakfast with his parents (Flash's mom told his dad that he'd gotten in the band, and he too was very pleased), and when the time came, walked out of his house with his guitar in hand, and walked straight to the address on the card that Satanik Pervertor, rhythm guitarist for Bronycorpse, had given him earlier. Luckily, it wasn't not much of a walk – only about four blocks – to a dilapidated old house that had been legally abandoned, but kept afloat by the members of Bronycorpse; being in high school still, they of course lived with their parents, but for them, the abandoned house was a perfect rehearsal space, mainly because there'd be no one else there to yell at them if they played too loud…

So Flash Sentry walked in through the door that led to the garage; and what a garage it was! It was decorated from ceiling to floor with skulls, pentagrams and inverted crosses. At the back of the garage where the bands amps and PA system stood was an altar with an inverted cross on the front, a skull on the table itself and a pentagram on the wall overhead. Also on this altar were candles, a chalice and a sword. On the floor in front of the altar was a giant black rug with a red pentagram on it; each member of Bronycorpse was to stand at one of the five points on the pentagram. As Flash entered the garage, his bandmates – vocalist Hest Endetarm, rhythm guitarist Satanik Pervertor, bassist Tartarus, and drummer Discordia – were already there in position, waiting patiently for him.

"Our demons froms Hell haths arrived!" Hest announced as he bumped fists with Flash.

"Aw, come on, I'm no demon," Flash blushed awkwardly.

"On that guitar, you are," Tartarus smirked.

"Yeah, man, I could never hope to play that "Freezing Moon" solo like you did yesterday," Pervertor chipped in.

"Anyway," Discordia cut in, "your amp is right here, just as we said it would be." And there it was; right next to Tartarus's Hartke bass amp was the Mesa Boogie Triple Rectifier half-stack that Flash Sentry would use when playing Bronycorpse – the loudest amp in the world was now in his hands, ready to do some major collateral damage.

"Well, I'm rarin' to go!" Flash proclaimed as he took his guitar out of its case. Without delay, he hooked it right up to the Mesa Boogie amp and turned it on, and also turned on the DigiTech Death Metal distortion pedal that would provide that black metal snarl. "So, what do we do first?" he asked as he took out his Dunlop guitar pick.

"Well, first things first," Pervertor said as he went and got a music stand for Flash. "Here you'll find the guitar tablatures for all of our original songs. Now here's what we're gonna do; we're gonna play a part of the song, and you play along following the tabs to the best of your ability. But knowing you, you'll probably get 'em down pat pretty quickly.

"How abouts we starts with 'Torns by the shafts of Lords Tireks?'" Hest suggested.

"No, that's too fast," Tartarus butted in. "We should start with 'Elements of Discord.' That's a good mid-paced song to start with." Everyone nodded their approval, and Flash flipped through the tablature to find the one marked "Elements of Discord."

"Everybody ready?" And with everyone in agreeance, Discordia tapped 1-2-3-4 on the hi-hat to jump the band into the song, "Elements of Discord."

For a black metal song, it was more mid-paced as opposed to the blasting speeds that the genre was known for. But even so, it packed more than enough punch to send an entire village running for cover (especially with Hest's possessed screaming). Even more so with Flash Sentry on guitar; with an extra guitar on board, run through an amp even louder than the one they already had, the sky was pretty much the limit for the level of blackness their music could obtain. Flash had no trouble; he very quickly, almost instantaneously, picked up on the tablature, all of its notes, slides, string bends, etc. And by the time the song was over, he still hadn't missed a note. And it was only his first go at the song.

"Holy crap, you are a demon on that guitar!" Discordia mused. "Deny it all you want, but you know it's true."

"OK, fine, I'm a demon," Flash grinned. "So what's next?"

"Well how's about we step it up with 'Nightmare Moon.'" Pervertor suggested. "It has some good, fast thrash metal-type beats to challenge our new guitarist here."

"Uh, well OK, let's do it," Flash beamed.

Once more, Discordia tapped 1-2-3-4 on the hi-hat to lead the band into "Nightmare Moon;" a song much noticeably faster, being made up in large part of 2/4 drum beats well over 200 beats per minute – similar to what you'd hear in polka, only much, much heavier and more powerful. But even with its brutal drumming and Hest's demonic snarls, for Flash, the guitar parts were a walk in the park.

"You nailed it again!" Pervertor beamed. "You're, like, a natural on that axe! You don't know how long it took me to learn the parts of our own songs, man."

"Man," Flash marveled, "guess sometimes I amaze even myself. Alright, what song's next?"

"Let's do 'Celestia Overthrown.'"

And so that was how Bronycorpse killed time the rest of that morning. Each song was a bigger challenge than the one before it, but Flash got all of his riffs, licks, leads and solos down perfectly in each song, including "Celestia Overthrown," Downfall of the Crystal Empire," "Raped by the Chimeras," "The Four Horsemen of Hate," "Demon's Chrysalis," "Blood Sparkles in the Eternal Twilight…"

…and finally, "Torn by the Shaft of Lord Tirek," the song that Hest initially pitched at the start of rehearsal. It was blazingly fast; Discordia looked like he was having a seizure as he hyper-blasted on the drums, Hest's vocals were so gnarly that he sounded about ready to pass a kidney stone, and the guitar and bass parts sounded like they'd be near-impossible for Tartarus, Pervertor and Flash. But they all nailed their parts with ease; even Flash got his solo, with all of the hammer-ons, pull-offs, two-hand tapping and whammy bar, down pat.

When the song was over, everybody was left panting, having gave 110% through the whole thing in all its brutality. "How… did… I… do?" Flash asked.

"Thats… was… phenomenals!" Hest panted.

"I think you're ready for our upcoming show," Pervertor said praisingly.

"Upcoming show?"

"Yeah, yeah, we've booked a gig at school Friday next week," Tartarus affirmed.

"For awhile, we were afraid that we wouldn't be able to do our own material any justice," Pervertor said. "Then you came along," he added with a wink.

"Oh... wow, a gig after only one week?" Flash mused. "Okay, now I'm excited!" But just as he said that, a distinct grumbling filled the confines of the garage - not from any of the band's instruments, but from their stomachs.

"Hey, what time is it, anyway?"

"Uh, ways past lunchtimes."

"Well, assuming we're gonna break for lunch, I'm gonna go back home and eat," said Flash. "When do we meet back?"

"I do nots think we should meets heres until tomorrows," Hest said. "That felts like enough practice for one days."

"Yeah, I'm gonna grab some lunch and crash," Pervertor shrugged. "See you guys tomorrow." And with that, the band all unplugged their instruments and turned off their amps; Flash packed up his guitar, high-fived his bandmates and left for home.

That there was how Flash Sentry's first practice session with Bronycorpse turned out. Every song was a blast for him to play, and he nailed every song, not missing a single note or chord. But now, he was never before looking more towards Friday; Bronycorpse had booked a gig at the school that day, and for Flash, this would be his first official concert as a performer, and not a spectator. Of course, since he first saw the want ad in the paper that led him to the band, he had known that they would be playing very extreme music; thus far, that had been a greater thrill than he initially expected. He did not, however, have any idea how extreme their live shows were, but as he would find out next Friday, the brutality of their concerts matched, if not dwarfed, that of their music...


	4. Black Mass Canterlot

Hungry as a horse (no pun intended), Flash Sentry trudged back into his house after his rehearsal with Bronycorpse. Though the rehearsal went really, really well, with Flash proving that he was in fact a highly proficient and powerful black metal musician, the grumbling of his stomach that had been permeating within him ever since they finished rehearsal had pushed that thought to the back of his mind, in favor of the thought of getting something to fill his stomach before it ate itself.

"So how'd rehearsal go?" Flash's father asked him upon his arrival.

"Really well!" Flash beamed. "I nailed all their original songs without missing a note."

"That's great, honey!" Flash's mom exclaimed. "But you haven't told us about this band yet. Like, what are you called, and what type of music, and stuff?"

"Uhhh..." Flash hesitated uneasily. What would his parents think if they found out he was playing in a black metal band? Would they forcibly remove him from the very first band he ever played in? Worse, would they forbid him from ever playing in a band of any kind ever again? Pummeled by these thoughts, Flash came up with what he perceived to be a little white lie;

"It's...uh, a soft rock band called...uh...Blooming Apples. It's like completely kid friendly and stuff."

For a second, Flash's parents looked at each other, unsure of what to make of Flash's answer. Yet at the same time, he'd never before given them a reason to distrust them, so Flash's dad decided, "For now, we'll play along. And we'll look forward to seeing you guys live."

"By the way," Flash's mom chipped in, "your lunch is waiting for you on the kitchen table."

"Alright, thanks, Mom." Not willing to dig himself in a deeper hole than he already might have been in, Flash dashed into the kitchen, where a giant peanut butter sandwich, green-leaf salad and cup of apple juice waited for him. He gulped them down as quickly as he could, and spent the rest of the day relaxing at home, albeit uneasily; he'd lied to his parents about Bronycorpse, and they were looking forward to seeing them live... and Bronycorpse would be performing at the school at the end of the next school week! The answer was easy, Flash thought. He'd just not tell them about the show, that's all! But what if one of his friends squealed about it? And then what would his parents think, not only about the band, but about the fact that he lied about them...?

After that, the rest of Flash's weekend went by quite uneventfully. The subsequent school week that followed was also quite typical, with Flash doing his work in and out of class, rehearsing with Bronycorpse for their upcoming show after school each day, and of course, dealing with Twilight Sparkle and Sunset Shimmer fighting over his affections. Which posed Flash another haunting question; what would the girls think? Flash really did want to get with one of them at some point, whether it be Twilight or Sunset, but would playing in this kind of band put them off him forever...?

...

Either way, that Friday, exactly one week after Flash Sentry successfully auditioned for Bronycorpse, was when the band was set to play their show at Canterlot High School, at the end of the school day. Flash's final class of that day was band, that of course, being the school jazz band. But as soon as the instructor marked Flash as being present, he promptly dismissed him.

"Really? Why?"

"Hey, we all know that new band of yours is performing here today. We wouldn't want you to go in unprepared, now would we?"

"Uh, OK, thanks. Wish me luck!"

And so Flash left the band room, guitar in hand, and from there promptly went to the auditorium, where Bronycorpse was scheduled to perform at the end of the school day. Stage hands were already there, rigging the sound systems, as well as fixing up the band's instruments. Flash, meanwhile, after handing his guitar to them, so that they could set the EQ and the tuning to where it was correct, went into the backstage area, where he saw Hest Endetarm, Satanik Pervertor, Tartarus and Discordia, already there, already gearing up for their gig.

"Flash! You mades it!" Hest beamed upon seeing Flash entering the room.

"What can I say?" Flash shrugged. "I can't wait to do this show, I'm so excited!"

"Yeah, us too," Tartarus concurred. "And with you on board, we're gonna me more powerful than EVER!"

Flash simply grinned bashfully. Pervertor then walked up to him, saying "But first things first; you're gonna need some of this," and promptly handed him...

"A makeup case?" Flash asked incredulously.

"Dimwitt, that's corpse paint!" Discordia exclaimed. "All the great black metallers use it, and we do, too."

"And yous best wears it, toos," Hest advised, "lest yous sticks out likes a sores thumbs."

"Uh... OK." And so with that, Flash retreated into the wardrobe that was marked for him, opened the case of corpse paint and read the instructions. Applying the basic design seemed to be easy enough; the areas around the eyes and the lips were to be black, and the rest of the face, along with the neck, were to be white. To accomplish this look, the case was equipped with a white base, a white powder to prevent smudging and/or melting, plus black eye shadow, black eyeliner, and to top it all off, black lipstick. Very carefully, in front of the mirror in the wardrobe, Flash started with the white base, covering the entirety of his face and his neck, except for his eye sockets and lips, and then applied the powder over the entirety of the base to keep it from smudging. He then applied the black eye shadow to his sockets, starting with his left eye, and then his right, keeping the eye that he was working on closed to keep from hitting his eyeball. He then applied the eyeliner to the areas right outside of his eyeballs, and finally, the black lipstick; it made him feel a bit awkward and feminine, but if it was the black metal look, it was game.

In time, Flash got his corpse paint on. It was a simple design, with no fancy artwork whatsoever, but it seemed to get the basic look down pat. When he emerged from the wardrobe, he saw Hest, Pervertor, Tartarus and Discordia waiting for him; they'd already gotten their corpse paint on their faces, and were using much more complex designs with the black to boot.

"How do I look?" Flash asked, unsure of whether or not his bandmates would roll with it.

"Like a corpse," answered Tartarus, giving two thumbs up. "It's perfect!" The rest of the band nodded their approval, as well. Flash, however, was still not sure that he'd fit in; the rest of the band weren't just wearing corpse paint, they were all dressed in baggy black jeans, with spiked gauntlets on their lower arms, and bullet belts on their waists. But what they weren't wearing were shirts; all of them had such defined physiques and prominent muscles that they figured they didn't need shirts on stage, especially Discordia, being the behemoth of the bunch.

"Uh, guys?" Flash asked nervously. "I don't have to take my jacket and shirt off, do I?"

"Uh... I don't think so," Pervertor said haltingly. "Why?"

"Because I'm a twig!" Flash confessed. "Schoolwork and the guitar don't do much for the muscles, you know."

"Fine, keeps your shirts on, stringsbeans," Hest laughed, making Flash roll his eyes.

"But it's not like anyone's gonna care what you look like!" Tartarus pointed out.

"Well then why are we wearing this corpse paint?" Flash asked, which plunged the band into an awkward silence before Discordia finally spoke up; "What we're trying to say," he said, "is just kick some ass on that guitar out there, alright?"

"You got it, guys!" Flash winked. And with that, Bronycorpse was pretty much ready to go; all that was left to do was to not do anything that would cause them to lose their focus, forget their setlist, or any of those little things that could throw a band off balance in no time flat...

* * *

><p>Shortly after the last class period ended, students were quickly filing into the massive auditorium. The curtains were still closed, so that the scenery of the stage might remain hidden from view until the band was ready to start playing, allowing them an element of surprise, so to speak. Additionally, in the spirit of this being a metal concert, though it was normally not allowed, students were allowed to stand in the area between the front row seats and the stage itself; equivalent to the general admissions area present in the typical rock music venue, where moshing, crowd surfing and stage diving often took place. At the front and center of this area were Twilight Sparkle and Sunset Shimmer, acting more like they were at a One Direction or Justin Bieber show than a black metal show. Also in the mix were the rest of The Rainbooms—Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Rarity, Fluttershy, and Pinkie Pie—plus the Cutie Mark Crusaders—Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo—amongst others. And in the two center front row seats were none other than Flash Sentry's parents, totally oblivious to the shock that they were about to see...<p>

When everyone was situated and everything was set, a stage hands stuck his head backstage. "Alright guys, we're ready to go on."

"YES!" Flash exclaimed as he, Hest, Pervertor, Tartarus and Discordia all took to the stage, which contained extremely grotesque decorations quite reminicient of the ones found in the band's rehearsal space. Even so, it was still quite fitting for the music, Flash thought as he and bandmates got in their positions - their instruments had already been plugged in and tuned, and their amps and PA systems had also been dialed in as well, so all that was left for them to do was wait for the curtains to open;

On the other side of the curtains was where Principal Celestia and Vice Principal Luna stood before the cheering crowd. Without further ado, the pair of them announced together;

"Now, will you please welcome the most extreme band that Canterlot High School has ever welcomed... BRONYCORPSE!"

"Bronycorpse?" exclaimed Flash's dad. "I thought his band was called Blooming Apples!"

"I don't believe it," Flash's mom replied. "Flash lied to us!"

The curtains opened, revealing quite a sinister-looking set to the audience indeed. Two giant pentagrams and two giant inverted crosses made to look like bone hung on the wall in the back, and on the front edge of the stage was a line of paper mache horse heads impaled on stakes. These heads, however fake, were made to look realistic, and did so so well that some in the audience thought they were actually real.

"They would do THAT to innocent animals?!" Fluttershy squeaked. "How barbaric!"

"Relax, Fluttershy," assured Rainbow Dash. "I'm sure it's just paper mache, or something like that."

"And ya gotta admit," Applejack added as she took note of the band members' bodies, "them guys are pretty hunky!"

"Yeah," affirmed Rarity, "in an I'm-gonna-slit-your-guts kind of way!"

And Sunset, noticing that Flash still had his shirt and jacket on, cooed, "Aww, why is Flash not showing off his bod?"

"Shut up, Sunset!" Twilight snapped. Sunset was about to snap right back at her, but before she could, the band had started playing, causing the audience to gasp at what was for many of them the most ghastly and abrasive sounds they'd ever heard from an ensemble of guitars and drums.

"He told us this was soft rock!" Flash's parents exclaimed. "What the hell is this crap?!"

The song that Bronycorpse chose to start off their setlist was "Celestia Overthrown," a song that Hest wrote as his way of expressing his opinion of the school's principal. It started off with Flash and Pervertor playing a heavy riff in the key of A minor, while Tartarus plodded along on the bass, Discordia played an incredibly fast blast beat on the drums, and Hest headbanged along in a circular fashion, making his hair whip around in circles as if it were the blades of a windmill. Many in the audience headbanged along as well, flashing the sign of the horns with their hands. Then, after several bars, the music slowed down to a more medium pace in the key of E minor, while Hest snarled these words;

_Sitting on her throne_

_The tyrants laughs maniacally_

_As her slaves bow down before her_

_Cutting themselves as penance_

_The tyrant licks her chops_

_Strong is her lust for blood_

_Unbeknownst that an even bigger tyrant_

_Hungers for her kingdom_

As the song quickly sped up again, a circle pit began to develop on the floor below, with students slamming into each other relentlessly as the music blasted furiously above. As Discordia continued to blast on the drums while Tartarus, Pervertor and Flash played their axes in E minor, Hest shrieked these words from his bowels;

_Celestia will be overthrown_

_Her reign shall die with her_

_In the wake of her blood_

_A new Reich shall arise!_

The song then went to a rather slow pace, with the drums slamming unmerciful. Normally, this would cause the audience to bang their heads like mad, but instead, as Tartarus and Pervertor riffed in the key of A minor, all of their eyes were on their lead guitarist, Flash Sentry. While the solo he played was not too overtly flashy or technical, the tritone notes he played on the harmonic minor scale sent shivers down the audiences spines and caused goosebumps to develop on their skin, while at the same time making Sunset Shimmer and Twilight Sparkle both scream with glee.

"Well you have to admit," Flash's dad acknowledged. "He is really good on that guitar."

"But I STILL can't believe he would lie to us!" Flash's mom exclaimed.

Then suddenly, as Flash ended his solo, the band went crazy; Discordia broke out into a lightspeed-sounding hyperblast on the drums as Flash, Pervertor and Tartarus played some of the most chaotic scales their guitars could puke out, while Hest screamed;

_Celestia lies dead_

_Beheaded by the axe_

_Drowned in her own blood, left to fester_

_Left for demonic vultures to feast on_

_THE NEW REICH HAS ARISEN!_

And with one more, loud, menacing 10-second shriek from the bowels of Hest's lungs, the song was over. Applause and cheers erupted from all over the audience, even from Sunset and The Rainbooms and Crusaders. Though neither of them were metalheads even the tiniest bit, they had to admit that Bronycorpse, terrifying as they were, did exhibit some impressive musicianship - especially on Flash Sentry's part.

Then, after taking a brief moment to recuperate, without even bothering to acknowledge the audience, the band kicked into their next song, "Nightmare Moon." Discordia thrashed his drums in a very fast and very heavy 2/4 beat while Flash, Pervertor and Tartarus played a seriies of tremolo notes in the key of E, and on the harmonic minor scale. For many bars, the band played like this, with Hest doing his windmill headbanging all the way; then as the drums kept going as they were, the guitars moved up to the key of F# minor as Hest began to rasp;

_A new moon shines this night_

_A moon of ultimate evil_

_Doom is spelt to those immersed_

_In the glow of the Nightmare Moon_

_This moon hypnotizes all_

_Who gaze into its menacing glow_

_It leads them into the pit of fire_

_To burn for the Nightmare Moon_

_Their flesh is burned, their skin is peeled_

_Their entrails are consumed to nothingness_

_Their remains are but a sacrifice_

_For the Nightmare Moon_

_In Hell dwell the souls of the sacrificed_

_Burning eternally, torn asunder_

_For worshipping not the bastard Christ_

_But instead the Nightmare Moon_

Then, as the guitars moved up to the key of G# minor, Hest, instead of going back to headbanging, promptly took one of the paper mache horse heads, tore it off of its stake, and then ripped it apart, causing a bucket full of fake blood and fake brain matter to ooze out. Of course, even though it was fake, it looked so realistic that some in the audience thought it was indeed real. Before anyone had time to react, Hest was already throwing the head, fake entrails and all, into the audience. And all of it just so happened to end up on Apple Bloom.

"AAH! GET IT OFF, GET IT OFF, GET IT OFF!" Apple Bloom moaned as she writhed around in shock, covered from head to foot in what she thought was real horse guts. Immediately, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo took her towards the far side of the auditorium and herded her towards someplace where she could get cleaned up. Meanwhile, Applejack was seething;

"Ah'll teach that bastard to mess with mah sister!" And before she could stop herself, Applejack pulled her way up onto the stage, and swiftly sucker-punched Hest right in the face. Without fully knowing what just happened, Hest, seemingly undeterred, jabbed Applejack in the gut in retaliation.

The hit was so hard that Applejack nearly collapsed off the stage. But even as she groaned in pain, she quickly drew on the toughness that came from being a country girl, came right back and punched Hest in his gut. Hest responded with a takedown, and the brawl continued on the ground, with Hest jabbing Applejack on any and all pressure points he could think of while she yanked at his long black hair.

Everyone in the crowd, save for Sunset and The Rainbooms, began to cheer like mad, chanting "FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!" as the two continued to grapple. The rest of Bronycorpse, however, continued to play the song as if nothing was happening; Discordia still blasted on the drums, Tartarus still plucked his bass, Pervertor still riffed on his guitar, and Flash was in the middle of a shredding solo; naturally, they were too far into The Zone to look up and notice the brawl that was taking place on their stage.

This of course, was the perfect spectacle for this audience; heavy, brutal, raw black metal and a fight! But then suddenly, as Flash Sentry was going into a sick vibrato on his guitar's whammy bar... the auditorium immediately fell silent, save for the grunts coming from Applejack and Hest, who were still grappling and striking each other on the floor of the stage. The rest of Bronycorpse continued playing for a second before they finally realized that no sound was coming out, and then, before they had time to wonder what went wrong, onto the stage stormed Principal Celestia and Vice Principal Luna. They had pulled the plug on Bronycorpse, and were furious over how out-of-hand their show had gotten.

Celestia rushed over and with her great strength, grabbed Applejack and Hest Endetarm by the scruffs of their necks, separating them and breaking up the fight. Even so, they continued to grab for each other in blind rage as Celestia growled, "You two! To the office! NOW!"

At the same time, Luna yelled out to the audience, "This massacre-fest is over! Out! OUT! EVERYBODY OUT!" With that, the rest of the students all hurriedly made their way out of the auditorium before any of them could get detentions or worse; Celestia dragged Hest and Applejack out towards her office; Satanik Pervertor, Tartarus, Discordia and Flash Sentry all quietly unplugged their instruments and slipped backstage... and Flash's parents stalked after them, both hellbent on confronting their son...


	5. Familial Bonds

As soon as Satanik Pervertor, Tartarus and Discordia were all safely inside the backstage lounge, Flash Sentry closed the door behind them. He and his bandmates were all panting heavily, trying to catch their breaths, as well as being shocked from having the plug pulled on them in mid-song.

"What... was... that... all about?" Flash asked incredulously in between pants.

"I... don't know," Discordia heaved. "Something about... a fight... or something. "I was too... busy on the drums to... notice."

"I think you're right about the fight part," Pervertor perked up. "Actually, I think it worked well with the music."

"Yeah, why'd Celestia have to pull the plug on us?" Tartarus wondered. "Did she really think that was a good way to express her opinion of that song we did about her?"

"Err... well," Flash spoke up, "it did get kinda outta hand when Hest and Applejack really started going at it and-"

"FLASH SENTRY!"

The door suddenly burst open without warning, and in stormed Flash Sentry's parents, furious with Flash for lying to them about his band, not to mention the fact that he's involved with a band of this nature.

"Mom... Dad..." Flash gasps in a shocked tone indicating that he knows he's busted. "H-how did you find out about the gig?"

"We overheard you talking about it with Twilight," his dad hissed.

"And you LIED to us!" his mom roared. "How is it that you even got involved with this... this devil band in the first place?!"

"Uh, w-w-well," Flash stammered, "I just thought they'd be a fun band to play in, that's all. I-I didn't think any bad would come of it."

"What are you, nuts?" Flash's dad retorted. "A death metal band?! I thought I told you before, those kinds of bands are nothing but bad news!"

"And we don't you ever playing in this kind of band ever again!"replied Flash's mom.

"Uh, excuse me," Discordia broke in. "First of all, we're not death metal, we're black metal. There's a major difference, you know!"

"Second of all," Tartarus chipped in, "who are you to control what Flash does with his musical career?"

"His parents, that's who!" snapped Flash's mom.

"Figures," Pervertor scoffed. "For all we know, your clear overindulgence into every aspect of his life is probably what led him to us in the first place."

"Screw you guys!" shrieked Flash's mom. "You're not to have anything to do with this band ever again, Flash!"

This outburst proved to be the one that brought Flash's bandmates to the end of their collective nerve. "He's not out until we say so!" Discordia thundered as he stood over Flash's parents, with Pervertor and Tartarus flanking him on both sides. "Now make one more move, and see what happens...!"

Ultimately, this brought Flash's parents into submission... for the time being, anyway. There was no way they were going to be able to take on anyone as brawny as Flash's bandmates - especially Discordia, being the hulking giant that he was. So all they could do for now was back down and "discuss" the situation at home, where surely none of the others guys from Bronycorpse would interfere.

"We'll talk about this later, Flash," Flash's dad hisses. And just like that, Flash's parents both hurry out of the room as fast as they can.

"Jeez, guys, don't you think you were a little harsh?" Flash questioned his bandmates. "Those are my parents, you know."

"Be that as it may," replied Pervertor, "you're our brother-in-arms. Brothers-in-arms stick up for each other. They'll stand up for anyone picking on a comrade - even if it's they're own parents picking on them!"

"Uh, well, thanks, I guess," Flash shrugged sheepishly. "So then, why aren't we sticking up for Hest?"

* * *

><p>"Sit your butts down!" Principal Celestia roared as she slammed Hest Endetarm and Applejack down onto the seats facing her own. They were in her office because they were the reason why Bronycorpse got the plug pulled on them - Hest had dumped fake animal entrails onto Applejack's younger sister, Applejack attacked Hest in retaliation, and it turned into an all-out slugfest on stage... while the band was still playing. Needless to say, Celestia was steaming, not only because she and Vice Principal Luna were forced to pull the plug as a result, but also because of the damage and injury that could've resulted.<p>

"Now somebody explain to me what just took place!" Celestia raged. Both Applejack and Hest (a big, tough black metal guy indeed!) were too intimidated to answer. Celestia was about to rage some more, but before she could;

"Excuse me, Celestia?" Vice Principal Luna said as she stuck her head in through the door. "Uh, before you do anything drastic, these girls would like to, uh, testify on Applejack's behalf."

"Alright, let them in." And so Luna opened the door all the way, and in came Applejack's little sister Apple Bloom, accompanied by her best friends Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle. She had been mostly cleaned from the fake blood and guts that Hest dumped on her while the band was playing their song "Nightmare Moon," but she was still very visibly shaken.

"That sicko," she moaned, pointing at Hest, "dumped blood and brains all over me! It was... _disgustin'!_

"It's true, ma'am," said Scootaloo. "Sweetie Belle and I were right next to her when he did it."

"Yeah, we took her into the little girl's room to get her cleaned up," added Sweetie Belle. "But, uh, it might take her awhile to recover..." She then glared at Hest. "And it's all _his_ fault!"

"Be stills, my heart," Hest sarcastically smirked under his breath.

"Ah was jus' stickin' up for my lil' sister, that's all," Applejack explained. "I mean, surely you'd have done the same for Luna... right?"

And after giving it several seconds of thought, Celestia was suddenly robbed of the will to punish Applejack for any wrongdoing - indeed, she would've done the same for her own sister, and Apple Bloom was looking like she may have been traumatized by what happened at the concert. She could only imagine how she'd feel if Luna ended up in a similar predicament...

"You're absolutely right," Celestia conceded. "The School Board policy states I should suspend you immediately..." She paused, making Applejack scared out of her wits for an instant, "But I see no reason to punish familial bonds, so I won't." Applejack, Apple Bloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle all breathed much easier. They were clearly glad that they were off the hook.

"As for _you_," she growled, turning to Hest, "your antics at your show today were so reprehensible! I can handle the fake blood and guts and the Satan stuff, but using that to torture an innocent little girl is just unconscionable, especially with how real those entrails looked! Furthermore," she added as Hest just rolled his eyes at her, "with how out of control you got on the stage, you could've caused some real costly damage to the stage and sound gear and stuff, _and_ you put own band in danger, as well! Now tell me just what you think of _that_, Hest Endetarm!"

"Oh, please," Hest scoffed. "My bands was nots in dangers - dey were stills playings through the wholes things. You're just mads because we playeds a songs about yous beins overthrown, dat's all."

"Don't give me that crap!" Celestia seethed. "You're suspended for all of next week! That should give you time to reconsider your band's image. Now get your ass outta here _this instant_, before I give you such a paddling with my old baseball bat! Do I make myself clear?!"

Hest dared not fight any longer. He simply hissed at Principal Celestia and then trudged out of her office in defeat. Some might suggest now that maybe, just maybe, he wasn't as evil and badass as he appeared and claimed to be...

"Now all you girls best be headed out," Celestia said to Applejack and the Crusaders. "You don't want to miss your bus, do you?"

"Uh... right," Applejack replied sheepishly. "Thanks for bein' so understandin', ma'am." And so, as Vice Principal Luna retreated to her own office to get some paperwork done, Applejack, Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo all strode out of the office together and into the lobby, where Twilight Sparkle, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, Rarity and Sunset Shimmer had all been waiting impatiently and nervously.

"So what happened?" Sunset urgently asked. "Oh, please don't tell me you're suspended!"

"Well Hest is," Applejack answered, "but Celestia let me off."

"Oh, thank goodness!" exclaimed Twilight Sparkle as everyone else nodded with her in agreement. "It's nice to see justice having been served for today."

"Yeah, like she told her," Sweetie Belle reiterated, "she was only sticking up for Apple Bloom. "God, that Hest is so scary! One look at him and I feel like he wants to crawl into my skull!" She startd to shiver uncontrollably at the thought.

"Don't worry, Sweetie Belle," assured Rarity as they all headed for the buses. "Hest won't be hurting anyone for awhile... I hope."


	6. Rabid

With little else to say between either of them, Flash Sentry, Satanik Pervertor, Tartarus and Discordia all simply retreated back into their wardrobes to change back into their regular clothes. They all washed off their corpse paint, and Pervertor, Tartarus and Discordia took off their spikes and bullets and put their shirts back on. They all then emerged from their wardrobes, dressed in their regular street clothes, looking at each awkwardly, unsure of what to say, until Flash finally spoke up;

"Guys?" he said timidly. "I'm not gonna lie; I'm scared! I really don't want to know what my parents are gonna do to me when I do get home."

"What do you mean?" Pervertor replied. "They don't, dare I say, beat you, do they?" A worrisome tone could be detected in his voice.

"No," Flash responded. "What I'm worried about is how they're gonna try and keep me away from you guys. You heard them say that they forbid me from playing with you again!"

"Like that should stop you!" Discordia scoffed. "Just tell 'em you're going out with some hot chick, or something. That'll throw 'em off the issue just like that!"

"Well, they think it should be Twilight Sparkle," Flash explained. "But Sunset Shimmer's also been trying to win me back since she underwent..._therapy_. I really would like to get with one of them, but I still can't for the life of me decide! What am I supposed to do? Flip a coin for them?"

"Unbelievable, how parents can be so meddling," Tartarus seethed.

"But listen, Flash," Pervertor assured him. "You have our numbers, right?"

"Uh, yeah."

"Good, because no matter what sort of BS your parents try and pull to keep you from fulfilling your dreams just because of some stupid on-stage theatrics, we'll all be here for you. You can call anytime something's really getting to you; we'll be there to listen. But most importantly, don't let them, or anybody else stop you from doing this. We still look forward to your continued tenure as lead guitarist for Bronycorpse."

"Uh, thanks, I guess," Flash said half-heartedly. And after high-fiving Pervertor, Tartarus and Discordia, he and the rest of the band packed up their instruments and left the auditorium en route to the buses...

On the bus ride home, Flash simply sat quietly in his seat, trying but failing to take his mind off of how his parents were going to confront him when he did get home. Normally, Twilight Sparkle and Sunset Shimmer would be flirting with him while reaching for each other's throats, but this time, they just looked upon him with worried looks on their faces. While neither of them knew that his parents were in the audience and had yelled at him backstage, they figured that, what with how teachers and principals rat students out for just about anything and everything, that they'd certainly find out about it sooner or later, and that they would indeed be furious, but to what extent, they did not know...

As the bus pulled to a screeching halt in front of his place, Flash stood up, drew his breath, and worriedly trotted his way off of the bus. Neither one of the Rainbooms found the will or the means to reassure him; all they could do was look on helplessly, afraid of what his parents might do to him when they found out what his band had pulled today.

Nonetheless, Sunset decided that she had to find out; something that Twilight surely would not have balls enough to do herself. She did, after all, pack a certain air of boldness quite close to that of Rainbow Dash—in her mind, a trait that could very well help her triumph over Twilight and reclaim Flash Sentry as her one and only. So when the bus stopped at her place, she did not step right into her house as per what she normally did. No, that would have to wait. Instead, she took off on a mad dash in the other direction, toward's Flash's house...

When she got there, she could already sense bad news, as she could see the silhouettes of Flash and his parents through the front window. Judging by how Flash's silhouette was cowering before the wildly flailing silhouettes of his parents, she knew they were really breaking him down hard. Driven on by, if nothing else, sheer curiosity, she crept up to the window and pressed her ear up as close as she could without being seen - this was what she had heard;

"They obviously worship Satan!" Flash's mom was raging. "We saw the pentagrams and the inverted cross on stage. Do you honestly want to be branded by everyone as a... as a... _devil-worshiper_?!"

"Yeah, none of us could handle that sort of publicity," affirmed Flash's dad.

"A lot of bands just use that to be theatrical or to provoke people," Flash tried to explain.

"Yeah, and it works because everyone thinks they're _serious_!" his mom rebuked.

"Yeah, but-"

"But nothing!" Flash's dad cut him off. "With you in a band like that, the public's gonna hate your guts, the media's gonna make fun of you... You ever consider maybe the fact that these bands play music like this is the very reason why they're social pariahs in the first place?"

"We'll let you go, for now," Flash's mom chipped in, "to think about those implications. And we mean, _really think about 'em_. And one more thing: make sure you clean that guitar of yours! I don't wanna risk our house being infected with some... black metal plague!"

"She's got a point, son," added Flash's dad. "Plagues bring rats."

And so, defeated, with no more arguments left available to him, Flash simply walked away from his parents towards his room.

Sunset Shimmer, having heard everything, quickly crept away from the house and started the walk back to her own home. In a strange way, she was relieved; they didn't seem like they'd be forcing him out of the band straightaway. They didn't seem like they'd beaten him any; knowing how much they loved their son, it sounded ridiculous. Yet, they were still really harsh with Flash over his choice of band to play in, and in an odd way, Sunset couldn't help but partially agree with them. _He should be able to play whatever kind of music he wants_, she thought, _but this kind of band does look like bad news, especially with that Hest Endetarm as their frontman. God, I hope this doesn't drive me and my Flashy further apart_...!

Speaking of Hest Endetarm, he was, at around the same time, pacing angrily back and forth in the backyard of his house in the woods on the city outskirts - an ideal habitat for a black metal musician, ironically enough. He had been suspended from school for the following week for his actions on stage, including his brawl with Applejack, and for that he blamed, not just Applejack, but her other friends as well, including the other Rainbooms, the Cutie Mark Crusaders and Sunset Shimmer.

"I mays be suspendsdeds," Hest seethed under his breath, "but I still needs to finds a ways to get backs at those stupids girl for gettings me in dis positions! Dey hits me once, I hits dem twice! Dey needs to knows dat we haves the gut to takes dis to the next levels, dat Bronycorpse are nos coward, and dat-"

Suddenly, a series of frantic rustling came from the underbrush nearby, along with some savage growling; a small, but vicious carnivorous animal was clearly on the prowl in that general area. But before Hest could think any more of it, that animal suddenly came charging out from the underbrush and right towards Hest. It was a raccoon, about two feet long, with gray fur, as well as foam liberally oozing out from its mouth, which could only mean one thing...

But for Hest, this was not an issue to him. As soon as the animal pounced, he simply reached out a hand and grabbed it straight out of the air by the scruff of the neck, holding it at arm's length so that it wouldn't be able to bite or scratch him. "Hmm, what to dos, what do dos, what to dos..." he said as he pondered just what to do with this rabid raccoon. His first impulse, admittedly, was to go get his hunting knife and neuter it right then and there; give it the "Bob Barker" treatment. But then suddenly, as his mind gravitated towards his previous thoughts on getting revenge on the girls who got him suspended, it all came together for him;

"Come ons, little fellas," he cooed cunningly to the raccoon. "I'm takings you tos your nice new homes."

* * *

><p>Fluttershy immediately got right up from her chair as the doorbell rang. She scampered right up to the door, unlocked it and opened it... but no one was there. All that was there on her doorstep was an abnormally large shoebox, with holes punched onto the lid, along with a red pentagram spray-painted on the lid, and inverted crosses spray-painted on the sides. But Fluttershy paid no heed to either of those decorations; her attention was instead focused on how the box was writhing around on the ground, on the growling that was coming from inside.<p>

"Who would do this to such a poor, defenseless animal?!" she squeaked incredulously as she reached down to open up the box. "Poor little thing! Don't worry, I'll take care of y- AAAAAAAHHH!"

Before she could stop it, the rabid raccoon suddenly pounced up and latched itself onto Fluttershy's face, scratching her relentlessly with its claws. Blood oozed out from the scratch marks as she writhed around helplessly on the ground, shrieking "GET IT OFF! GET IT OFF!"

"OH MY GOD!" Fluttershy's parents exclaimed as they responded to her calls and saw what had just happened. Quickly, her mother scrambled for the phone to call animal control while her father went to try and get the raccoon. But that was an ordeal in and of itself; the raccoon's grip was like that of a vice, and as if that weren't enough, its foaming jaws were getting closer and closer, and thus more and more ready to sink their teeth in, which would give Fluttershy rabies and leave her with only 10 hours to live, at most. As her father continued to try and pry the raccoon off of her face, Fluttershy's very life flashed before her eyes; undoubtedly her biggest regrets were not saving and caring for more helpless animals, as well as not allowing herself to be asked out by a certain somebody from the farm known as Sweet Apple Acres...

As for Hest, a maniacal grin bestowed his face as he watched with only the most sinister streak of sadism. "Perfects," he cackled to himself. "If all goes right, that raccoon will gives the lovely vet rabies, and she'll bes six feets unders before breaksfast! Heh! But that'll be only the beginning...!"

Suddenly, his thoughts were interrupted by the sound of his rumbling stomach. "Oh boys... Seeking vengeance make mes hungry. Better grabs me a bites at Sugarcubes Corner ons the ways home."


	7. From The Dark Past

With a chuckle, Hest Endetarm strutted into Sugarcube Corner and sat down at the snack bar. "Threes chocolate cupcake with bloods red frostings, please," he said to the waitress.

"Comin' right up." And less than a minute later, Hest was presented with his order with three chocolate cupcakes with blood red frosting on top. He paid five dollars for the cupcakes and then started to dig in, all the while relishing over what might possibly happen to Fluttershy;

"Ooh, I cans only imagines the look on her parent's face when she die!" he cackled to himself. "Plus, her friend will bes so devastateds they won'ts be ables to keep playings music, and The Rainboom wills surely collapse!" He was about to break out into an evil laugh when he suddenly remembered one major flaw to that logic. "Waits a minute," he said to himself. "Fluttershy's the tambourines player. Nobody give a damns about the tambourines. Evens then, they'll probablys just have Twilight Sparkles play it, or maybe puts it in Pinkie Pie's drum kit. If I'ms to really makes their bands collapse, I'll have to hits a members who's actuallys importants... and I knows just the ones! But how to gos about its, exactly, hmmm...?" And so Hest finished his cupcakes, tipped the waitress one dollar, and left the cafe, contemplating his next attack...

* * *

><p>Little did he know, however, that Fluttershy was in fact not dead. What he didn't take into consideration is the fact that rabies is usually only transmitted through biting, and the raccoon did not bite Fluttershy; it just scratched her. Nonetheless, her parents saw the foam coming from the raccoon's mouth, so they knew just how serious the situation was nonetheless. As soon as Fluttershy's father got the raccoon off of her, he slammed it against the wall of the house as hard as he could repeatedly, causing blood, bone and brain matter to ooze out of its skull, ultimately killing it and thus preventing it from transmitting its disease to anyone else. Once that was done, Fluttershy's mom told animal control that they had managed to kill the animal themselves, hung up, and they all piled into the car to get Fluttershy to the emergency room for rabies shots. While her father drove, her mother sent a text to Sunset Shimmer and the other Rainbooms, which stated;<p>

"Fluttershy was attacked. The animal was rabid. At the ER. Please meet us here; she could use the support!"

As soon as they did arrive, they rushed in through the front door. "Our daughter was just attacked by a rabid raccoon," Fluttershy's father panted, "and she needs shots now!"

"Oh my!" the receptionist exclaimed. "Uh, right away." Immediately, she got on the intercom and said, "We have a girl up here who needs rabies shots; someone come tend to her now!" A mere 10 seconds later, a nurse came in and escorted Fluttershy (her parents were allowed to join her) into the back area where she took her temperature, blood pressure and weight – all of which checked out OK – and then led her to a room at the far end of the wall, where she was to wait, along with her parents, for the doctor to arrive...

At around the same time, Sunset Shimmer, Twilight Sparkle, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, Applejack and Applejack's big brother Big McIntosh all burst in through the front door. "Where is Fluttershy?!" Rainbow Dash demanded.

"At the far end of the hall on the left," replied the receptionist. Without even a thank-you, the entire gang sped down the hall to the far end and piled in through the door to the room on the left, where Fluttershy and her parents were waiting.

"Oh, thank God you girls are here!" Fluttershy's mom exclaimed.

"Is she okay? Oh, _please_ tell me she's okay!" Rainbow Dash begged.

"Well, the raccoon didn't bite," Fluttershy's mom explained. "And rabies generally only transmits through the bite."

"And I made sure that that raccoon will never transmit its disease to anyone else ever again!" her father added with authority.

"Yeah, well she'll still need those shots," Big Mac noted, "but she should still be okay... I hope."

"That reminds me, Applejack," Fluttershy's mom perked up. "Your brother doesn't normally hang out with you guys, does he?"

"Oh, well, when ah told him 'bout what happened," Applejack replied, "he jus' had to come along. Hmmm... I wonder why..." She smirked smugly back and forth between Fluttershy and Big Mac as she said those words; their subsequent blushing only confirming Applejack's suspicions. Fluttershy's parents looked at each other promisingly; the Apple Family were, after all, respected as very upstanding citizens in the community, and if Big Mac wasn't an exception, he'd most certainly be a keeper...

"YAY!" Pinkie Pie squealed with glee. "Fluttershy's gonna be okay, _and_ she's got a boyfriend! Ooh, we have to throw a party when we get outta here! Oh, but what type of desserts and confetti am I gonna use... oh, I can't decide! C'mon, guys, a little help here, huh?" But all Pinkie Pie got in return for this comment was blank, flat stares.

"Anyway," Rarity broke in, "exactly what happened, Fluttershy?"

"Um, well," Fluttershy squeaked, "I was just minding my own business when the doorbell rang. I went and answered it, but nobody was there. There was just this shoebox on my doorstep; the raccoon was inside, there were pentagrams and inverted crosses all over the box again, and-"

"Wait, hold up!" Twilight broke in. "Did you say that box had pentagrams and inverted crosses on it?"

"Uh... yeah. Why?"

"Bronycorpse had those on stage at their show!" Sunset Shimmer declared. Everyone else in the room gasped. Bronycorpse were the only people they knew who would openly flaunt Satanic imagery, and of course, a certain one of them was indeed much crazier than the others...

"HEST DID IT!" Applejack roared.

"Hey, back up, Applejack," replied Rainbow Dash. "Are you sure that clown would even have the balls to pull something like that?"

"Yes, indeed, they are all quite scary-looking," affirmed Rarity.

"Hey, he was the one who spilled those horse guts on mah lil' sister, remember?!" Applejack bellowed. At this point, the conversation could have turned into an all-out cross-shouting match, but said instance was thrown off when the door opened, and the doctor came in, needles in hand.

"Alright, everyone here who isn't family, head back to the waiting room," he said.

"Excuse me, Doctor?" Fluttershy asked timidly. "Can Big Mac stay and hold my hand? I really could use the emotional support."

"Hmmm," the doctor thought before answering, "Well, if it's young love we're talking about, I don't see why not."

"It's alright, Fluttershy," Big Mac crooned as he tenderly clasped Fluttershy's right hand. "You'll be okay. Ah'll be here for ya."

"Take care, sis," Rainbow Dash waved. And with that, she, Sunset Shimmer and the other Rainbooms all headed out the door and back towards the waiting room...

"But seriously," Rarity then said, as they all sat down. "Not only are Bronycorpse scary-looking; sure, they can play their instruments, but their music is _terrifying_! Is their even a name for that... _noise_?!"

"Uh," Sunset hesitated before answering, "I believe it's called black metal."

"Black metal?" Twilight asked incredulously. "How come we've never heard of it?"

"Well, I'm kinda into the heavy music myself," Sunset admitted. "And I might not have listened to much black metal, if any at all, but I've seen pictures of some of the musicians, so I kinda figured that was also what Bronycorpse is."

"Well, that still doesn't give us a clue as to what they're really all about," Twilight said. "And there's only one way to find out!" With that, she took her laptop out of her backpack and turned it on. When it had fully loaded, she got on Google Chrome and searched "black metal."

"Alright, here's the Wikipedia article," Twilight announced. She clicked the link to the article; everyone gathered around her in anticipation and began to read;

According to the article, black metal was "an extreme subgenre and subculture of heavy metal music," and that "Common traits include[d] fast tempos, a 'shrieking' vocal style, highly distorted guitars played with tremolo picking, raw (lo-fi) recording, unconventional song structures and an emphasis on atmosphere." Said definition seemed to fit with Bronycorpse's type of music, though the girls agreed that they seemed to forego atmosphere in favor of all-out chaos and brutality. It also said something about artists using corpse paint and psuedonyms – though the guys in Bronycorpse presumably used their real names, the KISS-type makeup they were wearing must've been what the term "corpse paint" was referring to.

But as smart as Twilight Sparkle was, she knew that that alone couldn't really influence a sane person (assuming Hest Endetarm was indeed sane) to do crazy things like what happened to Fluttershy. Maybe their was something in the "history" section of the article that would shed some light on that? Either way, she scrolled down to that section, to the section that would shed light on the grim, dark piece of music history called black metal;

It started in the early 80's with the First Wave – while most of these bands were not regarded as black metal per se in present times, they were highly influential nonetheless. The term was coined by a British speed metal band called Venom; _Black Metal_ was the title of their second album. Then there was Hellhammer; from Switzerland, they played music bordering on death metal with Satanic lyrics, released in 1983, years before death metal itself even came to fruition; their successors Celtic Frost continued in a similar vain. Bathory, from Sweden, released _Under the Sign of the Black Mark_ in 1986 – arguably the first pure black metal record – and then went on to pioneer something called "Viking metal." There was even a more traditional heavy metal band called Mercyful Fate, from Denmark, who were highly influential on the lyrics and imagery of black metal – in fact, it was they who pioneered the use of corpse paint that would become a genre standard/stereotype. Other early bands included Bulldozer (from Italy), Tormentor (from Hungary), Sarcofago (from Brazil), Root and Master's Hammer (both from the Czech Republic), Samael (from Switzerland), Von (from the United States) and Blasphemy (from Canada).

The girls all agreed that this could conceivably influence a less sane person to do something weird, but even crazier things were yet to come, as they scrolled down to the Second Wave;

Even though the Second Wave of black metal had bands from all over the world, the heart and soul of the movement was none other than Hest Endetarm's home country of Norway. Bands in this movement mentioned in the article included Mayhem, Thorns, Darkthrone, Burzum, Immortal, Satyricon, Emperor, Enslaved, Carpathian Forest and Gorgoroth. These guys were undoubtedly the most sadistic heavy metal musicians ever conceived; as the article itself stated, "The scene also had an ideology and ethos. Artists were bitterly opposed to Christianity and presented themselves as misanthropic Devil worshippers who wanted to spread terror, hatred and evil. They professed to be serious in their views and vowed to act on them. Ihsahn of Emperor said that they sought to 'create fear among people' and 'be in opposition to society.' The scene was exclusive and created boundaries around itself, incorporating only those who were 'true' and attempting to expel all 'posers'. Some members of the scene would be responsible for a spate of church burnings and murder, which eventually drew attention to it and led to a number of artists being imprisoned."

"So they actually _did_ worship Satan?" Sunset gasped. "I thought it was all just theatrical."

"Well, they _did_ burn churches and kill people," Rainbow Dash pointed out. Twilight, meanwhile, scrolled down to some more details about this scene and their crimes;

The so-called figurehead of the movement was a man who went by the name "Euronymous;" he played guitar for the band Mayhem. He owned his own record label – Deathlike Silence Productions – and his own record shop – Helvete (Norwegian for "hell"), which was the focal point of the scene, as well as a meeting place for the bands Mayhem, Burzum, Emperor and Thorns, amongst a few others. But the real darkness began in April of 1991, when Mayhem's lead singer – known by the name "Dead" - shot and killed himself in the head with a shotgun. Euronymous used it exploitatively to foster the band's evil image by taking staged pictures of the corpse (one of which was used as the cover of a bootleg album) and actually taking bits of his skull and making them into necklaces, which he then gave to members of the Swedish bands Marduk and Abruptum. It was also claimed (falsely) that he'd made a stew with bits of his brain, and that Hellhammer – Mayhem's drummer – used the bones as drumsticks. False as those last claims were, the general way Euronymous treated the suicide was more than enough to get Necrobutcher – Mayhem's bassist – to quit the band.

"Why on Earth would anyone do that to their own bandmate?!" Rarity exclaimed.

"Oh my God...!" Sunset shuddered. "Now I really don't wanna imagine what Hest would do to Flashy!" Twilight couldn't help but glare at her as she read on to the bit about the church arsons;

As what they saw as the ultimate attack on the Christian faith, there were over 50 church arsons committed by Norwegian black metal musicians and fans from 1992 to 1996, and it had even spread into Sweden – which is more known for its death metal – by 1993. The main perpetrator of these was Varg Vikernes, the sole member of the band Burzum. Also found to have partaken in these acts were Faust and Samoth of the band Emperor (the former was also convicted of the murder of a homosexual man) and Jørn Inge Tunsberg of the band Hades Almighty.

"Ah don't see what they could've had against Christianity," quipped Applejack. "Islam's the true devil, if ya ask me. Actually, I don't see why none o' them were Muslims – if ya ask me, Allah's basically rendered Satan null and void." Nobody dared react to this statement; instead, they all simply read along to the part about the climax of the scene...

It occurred in August of 1993, when Euronymous was murdered in his own apartment – not by fanatical Christians, but by fellow musician Varg Vikernes, whom Euronymous himself had taken under his wing when the scene was just getting started. The motive was speculated to either be a power struggle, financial dispute over Burzum records, or Varg trying to outdo Faust at his own game, so to speak. Varg himself claimed that it was in self-defense, and that Euronymous had planned to kill him and make a snuff film out of it. Either way, in May of 1994, he was sentenced to 21 years in prison – the maximum sentence in Norway. That same year, Mayhem released their debut album – De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas, which featured Euronymous on lead guitar... and Varg Vikernes himself on bass! It had since remained the only album in all of music featuring both a murderer and his victim. Since then, the black metal genre had continued on, spreading to all corners of the world and diversifying musically, as well as lyrically and ideologically, but stilled forever marked by what happened in Norway, all those years ago...

So _that's_ what must be inspiring that clown Hest to do what he does!" steamed Rainbow Dash.

"Sounds about right," Twilight Sparkle nodded. "But I think we ought to look more into the band themselves."

She went back to the Google homepage and searched "Bronycorpse;" the very first link was to a website known as Encyclopaedia Metallum; better known as The Metal Archives, this site was regarded as the ultimate database and encyclopedia of all things metal, having comprehensive information on upwards of 100,000 bands from throughout history and all corners of the world, including Bronycorpse; Twilight clicked the link that took her to their page. It was on a black background with dull purple tinting, and the profile information at the top read as follows;

BRONYCORPSE

Country of origin: United States  
>Location: Canterlot<br>Status: Active  
>Formed in: 2014<br>Years active: 2014-present  
>Genre: Black Metal<br>Lyrical themes: Blasphemy  
>Current label: UnsignedIndependent

After reading through all of this, Twilight clicked on the tab labeled "MEMBERS" and read the following;

CURRENT LINEUP:

Hest Endetarm: Vocals (2014-present)  
>Satanik Pervertor: Rhythm Guitar (2014-present)<br>Tartarus: Bass (2014-present)  
>Discordia: Drums (2014-present)<br>Flash Sentry: Lead Guitar (2014-present)

Sunset was clearly outraged. "Now why did they have to put Flashy at the bottom?!" she exclaimed. "He's a much better musician than all those other buffoons put together! Right?"

"Right," Twilight replied with jealousy tinting her voice as she clicked on the name "Hest Endetarm." At the top of the resulting page was this;

HEST ENDETARM

Real/full name: Hest Endetarm  
>Age: 17 (born Oct 31, 1997)<br>Place of origin: Norway (Tromsø)  
>Gender: Male<p>

"He's from Norway, too?" gasped Applejack. "Well... it does explain that stupid accent of his."

"And he's from the same country as those Satanist murderers," Rarity pointed out. "It all fits!"

But there was even more to it than just that, as Twilight read further into Hest's Metal Archives page. There was nothing in the "BIOGRAPHY" section, but the "TRIVIA" section contained some absolutely jaw-dropping words;

"Hest Endetarm is rumored to be the son of Geit and Heks Endetarm, the infamous wealthy benefactors of the early Norwegian black metal scene of the early 90's. Believed to be worth in excess of 4,000,000,000 kroner (660,000,000 US dollars), they were convicted in 1994 for funding the church arsons taking place at that time, and they both served 2 years, 6 months in prison. It is also strongly believed that they contributed money to Euronymous's record label Deathlike Silence Productions, as well as his record shop Helvete; some even speculate that they offered massive bribes to Norwegian Correctional Services which led to Varg Vikernes's early release from prison in 2009.

Hest Endetarm is Norwegian for 'horse rectum.'"

"So that ruffian is _rich_?!" exclaimed Rarity.

"And his name's 'horse rectum?'" replied Rainbow Dash, equally aghast.

"Well if these that loaded," said Pinkie Pie, "he should be throwing parties for all of his friends every day!"

"Ah'm not sure if someone like him could have any real friends, Pinkie," quipped Applejack.

"Yeah," replied Twilight. "Plus, I'd bet that kind of money only gives him another reason to treat his bandmates like crap... and that includes Flash Sentry!"

"My poor Flashy!" Sunset Shimmer moaned.

"Hey, he's _my_ –" Twilight started. But before she could finish, Applejack jabbed her with her elbow and said, "Ah don't mean to interrupt, girls, but Fluttershy's standing right next to us just now."

Everyone looked behind them, and sure enough, there stood Fluttershy, covered in bandages from where the raccoon scratched her and where the rabies shots were administered. Big Mac stood beside her, still holding her hand, and behind them stood Fluttershy's much-relieved parents.

"Thank God you're alright!" Rainbow Dash beamed as she hugged Fluttershy. "And it looks like someone's in love." She winked.

"Eeyup!" Big Mac winked back.

"Listen, Fluttershy," Twilight Sparkle spoke up. "While you were being treated, we believe we figured out who set that raccoon on you, and we've also shed some light on what motivated them."

"Ironically, it's all very dark and grim," Sunset affirmed.

"Can't that wait until at least tomorrow?" Fluttershy's dad implored.

"Yeah, our baby's been through too much today as it is!" replied Fluttershy's mother.

The rest of the girls couldn't help but agree. So they all just silently walked out of the hospital, deciding not to dwell on the topic for the time being. They could also take some solace for the fact that Hest was suspended, meaning he wouldn't be able to cross any of them at school for the next week. But of course, the key words are "at school..."


	8. Digging Up Dirt

_With their cocks of fire_

_The chimeras penetrate_

_Fiery devilish cum launching fire_

_Filling them with their seeds of hate_

_There lie the embittered faggots_

_Humiliatingly raped_

_By creation's destroyers_

_Raped by the chimeras_

And with one last set of chaotic blast beats, the black metal band called Bronycorpse finished off their song "Raped by the Chimeras." It was Saturday, the day that they normally met in the garage at the old abandoned house in the suburbs of Canterlot; also the day following the one in which their vocalist Hest Endetarm set the rabid raccoon on Fluttershy – she had since recovered, but they were now onto Hest, for they deducted that it was he who did it, and they didn't really trust any of his bandmates either; even so, they were pretty much all in the dark. Neither rhythm guitarist Satanik Pervertor, bassist Tartarus, drummer Discordia nor lead guitarist Flash Sentry were aware of Hest's "off-stage antics..."

"Dats... dat was alrights," Hest commented as his bandmates all panted to catch their breaths. "Buts it stills sucked! De drum weres way offs pace! Seriously, Discordias, haven't you learnsed anythings from _Battle ins the Norths_?!"

"Hey, _Battles in the North_ was better than _Diabolical Fullmoon Mysticism_ and _Pure Holocaust_," Discordia retorted. "And besides, the drumming on that record, I think, makes it sound more chaotic – is that not kind of what we're going for?"

"Oh, whatsever," Hest shrugged, clearly dissatisfied. "Let's just play 'Demon's Chrysalis.' Are yous jackoff readys, or whats?"

"Yeah, sure," Pervertor, Tartarus and Flash all panted as they got into position on their instruments. Discordia then tapped 1-2-3-4 on the hi-hats, and they broke into fast, thrash metal-esque beats and riffs...

"Nos, nos, stop!" Hest bellowed. The instruments all ceased abruptly. "De guitar are offs sequence! What in de hells is with yous guy today?!"

"Hey, we're just playing it like we always have, man," Pervertor replied.

"Wells, it nots tight enoughs," Hest shot back. "Ands Flash!"

"What?"

"I've beens holding dis in for too long; dat guitars is so nots metal! Why don'ts you get sometings dat was actuallys made fors our kinds of music, likes an Ibanez Xiphos, or Jacksons King V, or someting?"

"Does it really matter what the guitar looks like," Flash questioned. "I've had this baby since freshman year. Just put on the right pickups, and you should be good."

"Oh, screws you guy!" Hest scoffed. "I'm takings five!" He trudged out of the garage and into the empty bowels of the abandoned house.

"Gee, I didn't know he was that... 'hardline,'" Flash squirmed. "How the heck do you guys manage to put up with it?"

"Well, it's not entirely his fault," Pervertor reasoned. "He really is a nice guy once you get to know him – he's just got a lot on his plate, that's all."

"What do you mean?" Flash asked.

"Poor guy comes from a poor family," Tartarus explained. "When he's not with us, he's spending his days cooped up in a crappy, dilapidated house in the woods on the edge of town, with no friends to go see him or anything. Hell, he's so poor, he can't even pay his own parking tickets."

"Oh... well, wouldn't he have been better off if he was a better driver?" Flash asked. "And how did he get away without paying for them, anyway? Shouldn't he be in jail, or something?"

"No," Tartarus replied. "I paid them off."

"Then again, it was _my_ car he was driving," Discordia added.

"Seriously?" Flash asked incredulously. "Getting ticketed while using your car? Okay, that's seriously so low, I'm beginning to wonder why you still allow him in our band!"

"Easy, Flash," urged Pervertor. "That's just the kind of stuff that you get driven to when times are tough. Why, I even got him a big-ass BC Rich Bich double neck guitar – he's always said that he wants to have his own solo side act, like many great black metallers have."

"Like Varg Vikernes?" asked Flash.

"Exactly," said Tartarus. "It would be murder to prevent anyone from living out their dreams... which reminds me; how exactly did you manage to get here without your parents buggin' you, anyway, Flash?"

"I just told them I'd be hanging with Twilight Sparkle and Sunset Shimmer," Flash responded.

"Well played," commended Discordia. "But seriously, whatever's going on with Hest, the fact remains that he is our brother-in-arms. And brothers-in-arms stick up for each other."

"Like you guys did for me?"

"Exactly."

No sooner had Pervertor said that word, when Hest reemerged from the depths of the house back into the garage, having shaken off his earlier frustration. "Alrights, guy, let's takes it froms the top...!"

* * *

><p>Of course, Hest Endetarm's situation was, in fact, nothing like what he'd claimed, as some of the Rainbooms were about to undercover. While Hest was rehearsing with Bronycorpse, his parents Geit and Heks had left to spend a day together sunbathing and getting "busy" on Canterlot Beach. And while they were out doing that, Twilight Sparkle, Sunset Shimmer and Pinkie Pie descended on their home for proof of what they'd read about them on the Metal Archives;<p>

"Wait, this can't be right," Sunset quipped upon seeing the house. "It's so small, crappy and dilapidated; wouldn't they be living in a giant mansion, or something?"

"Maybe they're donating all that extra money to charity!" Pinkie Pie suggested. "It would get them a tax write-off; rich jackasses _hate_ taxes, you know!"

"I wouldn't count on it, Pinkie," Twilight intoned. "Actually, this looks very much like someplace you'd find a creepy black metal guy; if I remember correctly, Dead and Euronymous were living in a hellhole a lot like this when Dead killed himself." She shivered. "By modern standards, Jack the Ripper would be jealous."

"Well, at least it'll be easier for us to work with," Sunset said as they approached the front door...

"Hey, it wasn't even locked!" Twilight and Pinkie exclaimed as Sunset effortlessly opened the front door.

"They're Norwegian!" Sunset quipped. "You girls think Canada is peaceful? Well, they're a war zone compared to Norway, heh heh! But seriously, here's the plan; Twilight, you're the computer genius of the bunch, right?"

"Uh, I guess you could say that."

"Right then," Sunset continued, "You go in and get on Hest's computer, and see what kind of dirt you can dig up on him. Pinkie Pie and I will stand guard out here at the door in case any of those Endetarms show up. We all clear?"

"Okey-dokey!" Pinkie Pie beamed. "We're gonna make Tommy Cruise and Sean Connery proud!"

"Yeah, sure," shrugged Twilight. And with that, she walked into the house, with Sunset closing the door behind her.

It was undoubtedly the creepiest house she had ever set foot into. The floor was covered with inverted pentagram rugs, and inverted crosses hung on the walls. Also mounted on the walls were pictures of the Endetarms along with various other Norwegian black metal musicians that she and her friends had read about while at the hospital; she couldn't identify them by sight, but she was certain that Ihsahn, Samoth, Faust, Necrobutcher, Hellhammer, and possibly Euronymous and Varg Vikernes were among them, and maybe even Dead, also...

After some looking around, Twilight found her way into one of the bedrooms; it only had one small twin bed, there was a desk with a laptop on it, a small HD TV on the bedside table, a really radical-looking double neck guitar sitting on a stand in the corner (much more sinister-looking than the one Rainbow Dash was ogling that one time), and the walls were covered with Satanic symbols and posters of various black metal bands whose logos she could not decipher. This, undoubtedly, was Hest's room, and the laptop was his computer – she had reached her target. Now all she had to do was get in...

Luckily for her, Hest's laptop was using Windows 7, not Windows 8 – that requires a password to get in all of the time, which doesn't necessarily hold true for 7. When the desktop loaded, Twilight got onto the Internet via Google Chrome, and then went onto Bookmarks – the Google Chrome equivalent for Favorites.

It turned out, Hest had bookmarked a lot of sites, most of which were to the websites of other metal bands, ranging from really famous bands to local bands whom he'd manage to befriend. But amidst all of those band pages, there was one link that stood out; "Bank Statements."

"Jackpot!" proclaimed Twilight as she clicked the link. To her surprise, she was taken right to his list of bank statements. Normally, there would be a password required to access sensitive information, and there was here; but Twilight didn't have to enter it because Hest had made it so that the browser saved the password, so that he wouldn't have to type it in every time he went onto a site that required a password. This, of course, would come with the consequence of allowing anyone to hack into those sites, as Twilight has just done.

She was presented with a number of statements spanning the course of a decade; the most recent of which dated to just last year; that would surely be the one that would provide the most accurate insight into the Endetarms' current financial situation, so she clicked on it. What she saw on the statement was very damning indeed;

The first part that stood out was what was on the upper left-hand corner of the statement. It was the name of the facility where Hest and his parents kept all their money; Cayman National Bank. Twilight's eyes immediately grew wide; she didn't have to read their address to know that this bank was located on the Cayman Islands down in the Caribbean. And the Cayman Islands had always been known as one of the world's most notorious tax havens, where rich individuals and corporations alike would hoard their money to keep their countries' governments from getting their hands on it. The Endetarms were no exception, as Twilight learned when she looked over to the top-right portion of the document.

There was where the family's net worth was stated: approximately $700,000,000 in cash and gold!

"That's even more than what the rumors claimed!" Twilight gasped. "Wow... I could've dated Hest for a few months."

The reason why they were worth more than what the rumors claimed was, as revealed in the statement, that those who perpetrated the rumors forgot that there was such a thing as a return rate. In other words, even though that rate was only 0.1%, that still translated into the Endetarms accumulating about $700,000 a month; in other words, they didn't even have to work. No wonder Hest was so unpleasant; he must've thought he could've gotten away with anything! Aside from that, Norway, being the social democracy/welfare state that it was, was also known for a ridiculously high tax rate, which placed much of that burden on the rich. No doubt that was why Endetarms had come to America in the first place — to escape those taxes; but evidently, as much the U.S. was known for catering to its ruling class, it still wasn't enough for the Endetarms, so they decided to store their money offshore so that the IRS couldn't get their hands on it, and they chose the Cayman Islands, since they would be much closer to them than Switzerland.

But by the list of expenses that was on the statement, one probably would've never figured that out. Their total expenses for that year were only around $30,000; just enough for them to get by without spending excessively. This all made sense; after all, it was very much the way famous Norwegian black metallers of the early 90's lived; in spite of their stacks of money, the Endetarms were still very much dedicated to the black metal ethos, and they probably wouldn't have liked the attention they'd have received from the commoners, either. Still, others might've called it fiscal conservatism gone mad...

Either way, Twilight felt like she'd gotten all of the proof she needed with this statement. Wasting not further time, she turned on the printer that was sitting beside the laptop, printed out the statement, folded it up, pocketed it, then turned off the printer and the computer, and left the room. She had to take care not to fall down the stairs in her flight.

It took a whole minute before Twilight exited the house with Sunset and Pinkie Pie flanking her.

"Well, Twilight, did you get it?" asked Sunset.

"Have we found the buried treasure?" joined in Pinkie Pie, excitedly. "How big is it? Enormous? Gigantic? Or even gynormous? Tell me, tell me, _tell me_!"

"I'll show you at the Boutique," explained Twilight. "Then, we'll just have to come up with a plan."

Sunset raised an eyebrow. "What sort of plan?"

"A plan that should have us save Flash and see Hest Endetarm behind bars..."

* * *

><p>Hest himself, meanwhile, was walking back to his place, having just called it a day with band rehearsal. Needless to say, he was not satisfied; being the traditional elitist that he was, he was so focused with the belief that all of the instruments, as well as his vocals, should be totally perfect; as tight and as brutal as they could possibly be. And no matter how hard Discordia banged on his drums or how fast he blasted on them, no matter how far up Satanik Pervertor, Tartarus and Flash Sentry cranked up their amps and their distortion pedals, Hest just didn't think that they were good enough. This might've led some to wonder why they didn't crack under the pressure and kick him out of Bronycorpse, but Hest had managed to convince his bandmates that he was impoverished and struggling, and naturally, they'd believed him and took pity on him; if ever there was something that would've clued him in on his real situation, it surely would've been how unappreciative he seemed to be of when they reached out to him, and especially of the effort they put into the music...<p>

That's when Hest looked up and saw Rainbow Dash going into her house from the front porch; she had been dozing on the porch for quite some time after having eaten a big meal, and now she was headed inside to take a big leak and an even bigger dump. But what really stood out to Hest was that she'd left her smartphone on the table on the porch...

"Ooh, yes!" Hest cackled with anticipation. "I wonders what sorts of dirts she has in deres!" With no one noticing, Hest snuck his way up onto the porch, took Rainbow Dash's smartphone and began to navigate through it;

He very quickly found the media folder and opened it; surely, there would be some music, photos or videos in there that he could use to smear her or use for blackmail. Again, he didn't have to look far; before long, he came upon a folder entitled; "Stuff for Soarin.'"

"Stuff for Soarins'?" Hest wondered. "Don't knows who dats is, but dis should bes good." He promptly opened the folder, and his jaw dropped when he saw what was on there.

"You have gots to be _kiddings_ me!"

There were many photos, along with several videos, showing Rainbow Dash wielding her guitar and wearing a miniskirt, her usual black shorts, long boots... and nothing else. Every picture showed her striking a number of different sexy poses that flaunted both her guitar and her B-cup breasts, erect nipples and all (it must've been quite cold in her bedroom!). The videos were pretty much the same, except that they were also able to show her shredding on her guitar, playing face-melting licks that some might argue would've given Yngwie Malmsteen a run for his money (too bad she wasted those talents on girly pop music, huh?). This certainly would've been more than enough to get this Soarin' guy hot for her; Hest had no way of denying it, for he too got quite aroused going through this racy content...

But by no means was he interested in love; rather, he saw this saucy stuff as a vehicle for one of the trickiest, most sinister acts one can pull on another person: blackmail. Without hesitating - he had to act fast before Rainbow Dash returned - he right-clicked and copied all of the topless content, then he accessed the Internet, got onto his own e-mail account, opened a new message, pasted all of the topless content on as attachments, typed a short message to go with it, along with a street address; then, he typed in Rainbow Dash's own e-mail address in the "Send To:" box, and then hit "Send."

"Perfects," he chuckled. "At least by nows, I won't haves to pays with my own moneys so oftens."

He then exited out of everything, set the phone down in the exact position that he found it in, and then quickly ran off of the porch and down the sidewalk away from the house before anyone could catch him. Then, just as he got completely out of sight, Rainbow Dash emerged from the restroom back to the porch. Though she couldn't immediately tell that her phone had been hacked into, it was beeping, notifying her that she had just received an e-mail. Without thinking twice, she picked up the phone to check her e-mail, unaware of the dire shock she was about to receive...


	9. A Proposition

_"__Pay up $100 in cash, slipped under the front door of the following address __by tomorrow __evening__, or else all the attachments on this message will go viral;_

_666 Lillehammer Lane_

_Canterlot, USA_

_ P.S: You have no idea how many loads I shot over these attachments. Prepare for utter humiliation._

"Pfft!" Rainbow Dash scoffed as she read this e-mail. This has _got_ to be some really stupid and pointless spam! Wonder what sort of retarded crap this joker attached, anyway...

"_WHAT THE %&#!"_

That was when she saw them. The topless guitar pictures and videos she had made of herself. Every single, complete image of her, her guitar and her B-cup breasts were there, in crisp, clear high definition. And she hadn't even put them online – at least, she didn't even remember doing so. Her breasts were meant only for the eyes of Soarin' – a freshman at Cloudsdale University on whom she'd had a long-standing crush – and yet someone, somehow, managed to get their hands on them. And she hadn't even put them out online, nor did she have any intention to do so!

"What do I do now?" Rainbow Dash asked herself frantically, her cheeks warming up. "What the hell do I do now?! I don't even _have_ $100 on me!"

For what seemed like an eternity, she paced back and forth across the porch, trying to think of a solution. She was initially hoping not to get her friends involved, but after a few minutes, she realized that there was no other way. She hadn't the resources to handle this dilemma by herself and she was too ashamed to consult her parents.

"_Everyone here meet me at my place ASAP! I'm in major trouble and I need your help badly_!"

She hit "Send," certainly not looking forward to what the girls would think about the nature of the mess she'd wound up in...

In a matter of a few minutes, the entire gang had arrived at Rainbow Dash's front porch, all of them panting heavily to catch their breath. "We all got yer text," Applejack panted. "Now tell us what 'n tarnation is goin' on, already!"

"Okay," Rainbow Dash said as she drew in a breath. "I'll just be blunt; someone, I don't know whom... well, they got some pictures of mine, and-"

"Ooh! Ooh! Were they cute pictures?" Pinkie Pie perked up.

"No, Pinkie," Rainbow Dash broke in before the party girl could go on one of her cheery rants. "Actually, well... How should I put this? They were... risque, provocative, uh... suggestive..." She stopped herself abruptly, wondering where she learned that expansion of vocabulary.

"Dashie, I can't believe you would take those kinds of pictures! I think this guy taking them, whoever he is, is the universe's way of telling you that what you did was wrong."

"Oh yeah, sure, blame the victim. Right you are, Pinkie Pie!" Rainbow Dash sarcastically scoffed.

"Uh... well, I don't know if this will help," Sunset says uneasily, "but do you remember the sender's address?"

"Something along the lines of 'black metal up your rectum,' or something like that," Rainbow Dash shrugged.

"_What_?! Let me see!" Before Rainbow Dash could refuse, Twilight snatched her phone out from her hand and pulled up the e-mail in question. Sure enough, there it was. The return address was exactly what Rainbow Dash said it was; "blackmetalupyourrectum ."

"I _knew_ it!" Twilight raged through her teeth. "_Hest_ did it! That BASTARD!"

"Um... are you sure?" squeaked Fluttershy.

"_Black metal_ up your _rectum_, get it?!" exclaimed Twilight "Oh, and here are the pictures."

Twilight showed everyone the pictures and the videos; the others originally weren't willing to believe it, but sure enough, they could see her breasts in every one of the images. Surely, it wasn't characteristic of someone as tough-minded as Rainbow Dash to stoop to such lowly, suggestive behavior!

"Well, I think the more pressing question here," Rarity broke in, "is why would you even take those photos of yourself in the first place, darling?"

"Uh, w-w-well," Rainbow Dash stammered as all her friends stared daggers through her. "Y-you see, the thing is, uh... I, uh, kinda like this guy-"

"Ooh, I knew you'd fallen for Soarin'!" Pinkie Pie exclaimed. "I knew it, I knew it, I _knew_ it!"

"Alright, easy, Pinkie," urged Sunset. "I think the rest is self-explanatory. What we need to do now is find a way to take Hest Endetarm and his goons down a peg."

Again, Pinkie Pie was the first to speak up. "Battle of the Bands! Battle of the Bands!" she cheered. "We both have bands, and the music we do is _way_ more popular than theirs, and what better way to beat an enemy than with music? Right? _Right_?"

"That's... actually a very good idea, Pinkie!" Rainbow Dash beamed. "You're absolutely right. Plus, I'll get to show those losers just how much better I am at guitar than they are. It's perfect!"

"Hey, _no one's_ a better guitar player than Flash Sentry!" Sunset growled. "Hear me? _No one_!"

"Oh, shut up, Sunset!" Twilight snapped. "Besides, you're forgetting that what we're trying to do here is get rid of Hest; as in, put him behind bars where he belongs."

"Maybe we could just get him deported back to Norway...?" Fluttershy squeaked.

"Aw, please!" Rarity scoffed. "That wouldn't be a punishment at all; Norway has the highest standard of living in the world... and their prison cells are like hotel rooms! Seriously!"

"Well, Norway does have really high taxes," Applejack explained. "That's probab'ly why they came here; to evade those darn taxes."

"I think that's _exactly_ why they came here, Applejack," replied Twilight, ominously. "But either way, regardless of what country it's in, Hest really is better off behind bars. Personally, I'd prefer that they detain them here in America, where criminals actually get their comeuppance... Whatever we do, we can't be straightforward about it. Hest may not be the smartest guy, but he's really mean enough, cunning enough, and manipulative enough. If he figured out we were onto him, he'd surely find a way to weasel himself out of it.

"That's where this Battle of the Bands comes into play. We'll pass it off as just a friendly competition between two bands with differing tastes in music; that's something I'm sure the guys in Bronycorpse will really dig. Hest will let his guard down, which would distract him from our moves, and hopefully lead him to forget about blackmailing anyone anymore. It's perfect!""Hopefully..." Rainbow Dash shivered, afraid to even think about what would happen if those pictures did indeed go viral...

"There's just one thing, darling," Rarity chipped in. "If this whole thing really is going to be a big ruse to defeat Hest and get him in jail, then just how exactly are we going to get the police involved. More importantly, where are we going to find an audience? We need an audience to rule in favor of us, you know!"

"Actually, it just came to me," Twilight grinned. "It could be part Musical Showcase, part Battle of the Bands! It'd be run by our school, and held at the Canterlot Concert Hall downtown. That's where our audience would come from. The Musical Showcase would be the side show, so to speak, with numerous opening acts from school, and maybe from around town, as well. Then the Battle of the Bands between Bronycorpse and The Rainbooms would be the headliner, of course. And knowing how much more popular our brand of music is than theirs, as Pinkie Pie pointed out, we'd win by a landslide!"

"Well, I certainly would love to beat 'em that way," Rainbow Dash said. "But what about the whole 'putting Hest in jail' thing, hmm?"

"Unfortunately," sighed Twilight, "we don't have any hard evidence of when he set the raccoon on Fluttershy." She face beamed almost instantly as another thought struck her. "But I have the evidence of his family's tax evasion, and you, Rainbow Dash, have the evidence of his blackmail attempts on you, which I think might also qualify as sexual harassment... Sometime this week, you'll go to the police with those candid pics and videos, and I'll go to them with the bank statements. We should preferably do that sometime early this week; it'll take them some time to get their arrest warrant put together."

"Err, well how exactly are we gonna get the school to set this whole thing up?" Applejack asked. "Have ya thought o' that?"

"Well I do know that Principals Celestia and Luna do love music," Twilight answered, "so I'll just talk to them about it; they should jump on the idea. And after what happened last time a certain band performed at the school, I think they'll be keen on holding the show away from there."

"Don't remind me..." Applejack shivered.

"And when do you think this show should be held, exactly?" inquired Sunset.

"Next weekend," Twilight responded. "Remember, Hest will be suspended from school this coming Monday through Friday; if the show is held during the week, he won't be able to show up, which means neither Bronycorpse nor the cops show up, which means the whole thing will be a bust!

"Oh yeah, and tomorrow is when we should meet Hest and Bronycorpse and talk to them about it. But again, nobody clue them in to the fact that we're onto them, because he _will_ find a way out. Which reminds me; Fluttershy?"

"Um... yeah?"

"I think it's best that you stay home while the rest of us are meeting the band," Twilight said. "Not only are you still clearly shaken up from what happened yesterday, but if Hest saw that you were still alive, he'd be tipped off for sure, and that'd totally ruin our plans."

"Any crazy escape plan or Ponzi scheme he'd come up with would likely involve his band getting roped in," added Sunset, "including Flash. So it'd be best if we don't give Hest an excuse to get a head start... for Flashy's sake."

Twilight glared at Sunset as she said those last words, but quickly pulled back her jealousy. She knew her friend made a point.

"Well we're not gonna meet them at Hest's house, are we?" Pinkie Pie asked urgently. "'Cause that place is so creepy, and _so_ not a good place for a party!"

"Actually, I have an idea," Sunset suggested. "You all know that abandoned house that's just a few blocks away from Flash's place?"

"Uh... yeah," the other girls all said.

"Well, have any of you realized how, uh, noisy that place is for being abandoned?"

This led the other girls into deep thought. It was true; that house was pretty noisy for a place that was abandoned. But why, exactly...?

"You mean..." Rainbow Dash spoke up.

"Precisely!" Sunset exclaimed. "I have no doubt that Bronycorpse is using that house as their rehearsal space. But I think it's best that we all not meet right in front of that house; that way they don't get suspicious. You know the fire hydrant that's about halfway in between Flash's house and the abandoned house? Well, we'll meet there at 11:00 tomorrow morning; from what I've heard, the band is sure to be rehearsing then. Once we're all together at the hydrant, we'll head to the house together and confront them there. Agreed?"

"Agreed," everyone replied in unison. So, with their plans in place, and thus with nothing more to discuss, Twilight Sparkle, Sunset Shimmer, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, Applejack and Rarity all exchanged hugs and dispersed, each one of them absolutely raring to set this grand play in motion...

hr /

By tomorrow morning, Sunset was the first to arrive at the fire hydrant, at 10:55 AM. She did not have to wait much longer; by 11 AM, Twilight, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Applejack and Rarity were all gathered at the hydrant.

"Alright, everybody ready?" Sunset asked, to which the others all nodded.

"Cool. I'll lead the way." And with that, Sunset walked forward, the other girls tagging along from behind. Sure enough, just two blocks up the street, exactly where Sunset said it was, was the abandoned house. It was indeed, very old and dilapidated, and there was, indeed, very ghastly sounds coming from behind the closed garage door; if what Sunset said about this place was true, then there'd be no denying what those sounds were...

"Alright girls, let's do this," said Sunset as she led the girls up to the garage door. When they got there, Sunset gripped the bottom edge of the door and lifted with all of her might. Sure enough, with minimal trouble on Sunset's part, the door was lifted all the way up. And there, in the garage that looked more like a Satanic altar, was Bronycorpse in the flesh – rhythm guitarist Satanik Pervertor, bassist Tartarus, drummer Discordia, lead guitarist Flash Sentry and vocalist Hest Endetarm. They had just finished up their song "The Four Horsemen of Hate," and they were quite startled to see that they had been barged in on, but they very quickly recognized the intruders;

"Hey girls, what's up?" Flash greeted them.

"Whats in the names of helvete is de meanings of dis?!" Hest demanded. "Do yous not knows how rudes it is to just barge ins on a bands when they're practicings?"

"Actually it's good that you guys are practicing," Twilight smiled innocently, "because we just so happen to have a proposition for you."

"What kinds of prospositions?" Hest asked. As he did so, he took notice of the fact that Fluttershy wasn't there; it was obvious to him that she was, indeed, dead. Yet none of her friends were showing signs of grief – then again, she _was_ only the tambourine player, after all. And the tambourine's not even a real instrument, anyway...

"We were thinking," Twilight explained, "just a friendly competition between your band and my band. I know and you know that are musical genres are always at war with each other, so maybe this friendly competition will get us both some closure, and hopefully some good fun! What do you think of that, hmm?"

"You mean likes a Battles of the Band?"

"Exactly."

After giving the matter a mere second of thought, Hest signaled the Rainbooms the wait, and then made a signal to his bandmates, which led to Bronycorpse all huddling up together; it was clear that Hest had a plan of his own;

"Dis is perfects, you guy," Hest said to them. "Assumings dat dere'll bes an audience, dis'll be the perfects opportunsity to show everyones just hows much betters we are than them!"

"Uh, I'm not sure that the majority of them would agree," Pervertor replied uneasily. "Our music is not at all mainstream, you know; in fact, that's the very thing it seeks to steer clear of."

"Well anyone that doesn't like it will likely be running out the door terrified," Tartarus smirked. "That's how we'll know we've done well."

"Well, either way, we'll be doing what we do best," affirmed Discordia, "and that's playing the most grim, raw, necro black metal imaginable!"

"I just think merely playing the music will be fun that's all," Flash shrugged with a smile. "But then again, what's the point of playing music if you're not having fun doing it? Right?"

"You're rights," Hest nodded. "You're alls right, in fact. Ands I just cames up with a killers idea...!"

In no time, Bronycorpse broke their huddle. Hest turned to The Rainbooms and said, "We have decidsded, Rainboom, tos accept your challenge, but onlys under ones condition; we tinks that, in orders to level the playings field, sos to speak, our littles 'battle' should be black metal vs. black metal!"

"Are you serious?" exclaimed Sunset. Instantly realizing what a stupid question that was, she gave an exasperated look. "You're serious, aren't you?"

"I'ms dead serious!" replied Hest. "Yous do blacks metal, or yous get disqualsifieds! Really, the onlys way yous chump will be ables to beats us anysway is with black metals more raws and brutal thans ours, not dat dere such a ting. And beside, whats better way to beats someone dan at deirs own games, right? But seriously, eithers you play black metal ins our battle, or yous play nothings and get disqualsifieds. Dis is nons-negotiable! Agreeds?"

Most of The Rainbooms looked at each other incredulously, unsure of how they'd stand a chance with this stipulation imposed. But then Rainbow Dash stood and said boldly, "Agreed! And may the best band win."

"Oh, wes intend tos," Hest smirked. "Now gets de helvete outs of here!" And he reached up and closed the garage door, laughing maniacally as his came down; he obviously thought that he and his band would have an easy victory. Surely, no one like The Rainbooms could do anything even remotely close to traditional heavy metal, much less black metal!

Once the Rainbooms were well out of earshot, Rainbow Dash prepared for whatever criticism the others had for her. Sure, what she just did was crazy, but surely not as much as sending topless pics and videos of herself to a potential crush. She'd understood _that_ much.

"Rainbow Dash, have you gone completely _mad_?!" snapped Rarity. "We're not going to be able to stand a chance now!"

"Oh, I think we will," Rainbow Dash smiled to her friends and bandmates. "We have the musical skill to do any kind of music, including black metal! And Hest said it himself; what better way to beat them than at their own game! Right?"

Sunset, Twilight, Pinkie Pie, Applejack and Rarity looked at each other for a few moments. They couldn't help but agree, even though they were unsure of their own abilities to even approach music as dark, evil and chaotic as black metal. Nonetheless, they all knew that the only way that they would stand a chance at taking Hest down was by standing up to the challenge, in spite of the new, super-steep slope that had just risen in front of them. And somewhere in each and every one of them, they knew that somehow, in some way, even if the audience didn't vote for them and Bronycorpse won the battle, the Rainbooms would ultimately win the war, and Hest would lose it...


	10. The Grand Plan

The next Monday morning, the school bus stopped in front of Canterlot High School, beginning another school week after the crazy weekend that had just transpired. For Sunset Shimmer, Twilight Sparkle, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, Applejack and Rarity, being back at school came with a strange sense of relief.

Phase 1 of this grand plan was setting up the Battle of the Bands that Bronycorpse and The Rainbooms agreed to, and for that, Principal Celestia and Vice Principal Luna had to be brought on board to the idea. So, as soon as she got off the bus, without even acknowledging her friends about it, Twilight ran full speed ahead, into the building and down the hall.

Once at the door to the principal's office, she knocked at the door and was immediately buzzed in. There sat Celestia at her desk, with Luna standing at her side.

"Good morning, Twilight," greeted Celestia cordially and casually.

"What brings you here?" inquired Luna. "Not another review of some 'failed exam,' I hope." She did what she could not to laugh.

"Well actually, I need your help with something big," Twilight replied. "Hest Endetarm is up to no good, and we think we have a plan to put a stop to it, but for that, we need you on board."

"Seriously?" Both sisters were aghast – especially Celestia. "I suspended that troublemaker just last Friday!" she exclaimed. "And he's _still_ up to no good? What's he done this time?

"Uh, well," began Twilight nervously, "he set a rabid raccoon on Fluttershy and stole a bunch of... sensitive media of Rainbow Dash; he planned to blackmail her, but we agreed to a battle between our two bands in order to distract him from that issue. But that's just a part of a bigger plan to bring him down and I need your help."

Celestia and Luna exchanged incredulous glances. Being in the positions of authority that they were, they'd thought that their power and influence was more than enough to set anyone straight when called for. But apparently, Hest had not been deterred – certainly not something that either of them were used to when it came to discipline – and considering how dangerous he was, they decided it might behoove them to play along with whatever Twilight had in mind. After all, Twilight was certainly the kind of person with the intelligence and cunning that was required to deal with creatures like Hest Endetarm.

"What can we do to help?" Luna asked eagerly.

"We need you to organize our Battle of the Bands," Twilight explained. "Actually, I was thinking; to get more of the students involved, the brunt of the event would be a musical showcase with various other bands from the school as the opening acts, so to speak. The Battle of the Bands between Bronycorpse and The Rainbooms would be the main event. But anyway, the idea is that Hest will be so determined to win, that he'll be so busy rehearsing with his band that he'll be too distracted from our plans. After school tomorrow, if not today, Rainbow Dash and I are going to the police; she's going to show them the e-mail that proves he harassed her, while I'm gonna show them a real dirty secret that'll have him and his family put away for a real long time!"

"What kind of dirt?" Celestia asked with intrigue.

"Uh... I'll save that story for later," Twilight said sheepishly. "Anyway, my idea was for you to see if you could rent out the Canterlot Concert Hall this Saturday evening and hold this event then and there. I know you're a bit reluctant on holding it here after what happened last time... plus, it takes a while for the cops to make those arrest warrants and junk. Oh,and if you hold it during the week, Hest won't be able to perform, because he's suspended, remember?"

"Quite right," acknowledged Luna. "But what about that raccoon attack you mentioned?"

"I'm afraid don't have any hard evidence of that for the cops. But we _do_ have proof of the harassment; that and the dirt I've dug up on the Endetarms is sure to have them locked away."

"Yes, and it's a great way to get the students involved in something," Luna beamed to Celestia. "They, of course, will vote for The Rainbooms in the end, because your pop music is so much better than their noise... right?"

"Uh, well actually..." Twilight started. But before she could finish, Celestia broke in:

"We'll contact the Concert Hall and start getting this event set up straightaway!" she smiled. "Now you best be off, Twilight; I believe the first bell is about to ring."

"Thanks for everything, ma'ams." Twilight waved as she saw herself out of the office and on her way to her first class of the day. So far, so good; Celestia and Luna were on board. 

* * *

><p>The rest of the school day went by rather typically. Everyone went through all of their classes as normal, except that they could all breathe easier without Hest there to harass them. The other major difference here was that, at least for the time being, Sunset and Twilight were not obsessively arguing over Flash Sentry. There was no point in it, for this time, they both had a common goal, and that was to save Flash from the clutches and influence of Bronycorpse...<p>

When school was officially dismissed, rather than get on the bus, Twilight and Rainbow Dash walked straight towards the Canterlot Police Department. It was good to get some exercise.

"I'm not gonna lie to you, Twilight," Rainbow Dash said in an uncharacteristically nervous tone. "I've, uh, never had to file a report with the cops before."

Twilight sighed. "I figured as much. And I know it isn't in your nature, but it would be best to act as distressed as possible. You know, hyperventilate, talk frantically, maybe even force out a couple of tears if you can."

"I still don't know... what'll happen to my street cred?"

"Look, do you want the police on our side, or not?" asked Twilight sternly.

"Yeah," Rainbow Dash answered somberly. "I do. _Badly_."

A few minutes later, the two arrived at the police station. Before they entered the building, they got their evidence ready; Twilight pulled the Endetarms' bank statement out from her backpack, and Rainbow Dash pulled up the racy e-mail on her smartphone, and then the two went in. Putting on their urgent faces, the pair went up to the front desk, saying that they had a report and a tip to file. Immediately, the receptionist called for two detectives, and shortly afterwords, Twilight and Rainbow Dash were escorted out of the lobby and into two separate conference rooms by Detective Bore and Detective Hogg, respectively.

"I have some evidence that'll blow your mind!" Twilight exclaimed to Detective Bore. "You know the Endetarm family?"

"Who?" asked a perplexed Bore.

"You know, Hest Endetarm, the crazed lead singer for that band Bronycorpse!"

"Uh, I think I've heard of them," Bore replied. "I heard they got a really awesome lead guitarist... but what's this gotta do with them?"

"Well, that's just it," Twilight explained. "I've discovered that Hest and his family are here in America for all the wrong reasons. They came here from Norway to avoid their high taxes, but they've gone way too far doing so. See for yourself."

Twilight promptly handed Detective Bore the bank statement. His eyes grew wide as he read what he saw on that paper; a black metal family, seemingly living in poverty as metalheads were known for, but were actually worth in excess of the equivalent of 700 million US dollars! And they hadn't had to pay a single dime in taxes, as all of that money was stored offshore in the Cayman Islands without them notifying the I.R.S; a clear and blatant violation of the Foreign Accounts Tax Compliance Act (FATCA)!

"This is big!" exclaimed Bore. "This is some really serious dirt you've dug up. Just how did you come by this anyway?"

"It was, uh, inadvertently leaked to me by Hest's relatives," Twilight responded. If she had spilled the beans, she could be arrested for breaking and entering, as well as hacking. Not to mention the fact that if it was known that this evidence was obtained illegally, it would not be allowed to be used in court.

"Uh, OK," the detective shrugged. In all honesty, he didn't care how the evidence was obtained, as long as he got another bust for his quota. "Well, we'll get this evidence submitted, but it'll likely be the weekend before we can get the arrest warrant out, and-"

"Perfect!" Twilight said. "I know for the fact that Bronycorpse is performing this Saturday night at the Canterlot Concert Hall! You should drop by there and bust him then!"

"I'll make a note of that," noted the detective. "Well, thanks for the tip. I'm gonna go submit this evidence and get that warrant. You can go, now."

"Alright, thanks a lot, officer!" Twilight smiled as she exited Detective Bore's office... 

* * *

><p>"So what seems to be the problem, ma'am?" Detective Hogg asked Rainbow Dash.<p>

"It's awful!" cried Rainbow Dash in a panic. "This jerk... Hest Endetarm... I don't know how he did it, but somehow, he got a hold of a bunch of embarrassing footage of me, and he's been threatening... he... He's been threatening to post them online! What if he actually does it?! I'll be_ruined_! What the hell am I gonna do?!

She took one rushed breath before sobbing out, "_You gotta heeeeelp meeeeee_!"

"Ma'am, relax," Detective Hogg urged. "Now this man hasn't yet posted these images, has he?"

"No," Rainbow Dash answered as she started to tone down the blatant display of distress. "But he could at any moment, and I really don't know what to do!"

"Your evidence?" Hogg asked routinely, almost apathetically.

Rainbow Dash handed him her smartphone, which was already showing the incriminating e-mail. It didn't take long for Hogg to skim through the list of photos and videos. He looked as if his eyes were going to pop out.

"Now just who are you trying to attract with these sorts of crazy displays, anyway?" asked the detective as he tried like hell to not look the least bit aroused.

"Uh... this college freshman at, uh, Cloudsdale University," Rainbow Dash blushed nervously.

"Figures," Hogg scoffed. "I got me a daughter in college over in Manehattan who does this same sort of crap to try and win guys over! I try and tell her that that's not gonna land her a good man; it's only gonna land her a dirty pig. But she never listens."

Suddenly, Rainbow Dash became outraged. There was something about the seemingly disparaging way this detective was describing her methods of attraction that just set her off.

"Are you blaming the victim?!" she snapped. "Because if you are, then you're the pig here! And not because you're a cop, either!"

"Ma'am, relax!" Detective Hogg urged once more. "I'm not blaming you. I'm just saying that there are more reasonable ways to win over this boy."

"Well what the hell would _you_ know?" Rainbow Dash scoffed defiantly.

"What I do know," Hogg replied firmly, "is that all you have to do is ask him out, already. The worst he can do is say no. But let's face it; when a girl asks a boy out, the boy is pretty much obligated to say yes. Right?"

"I guess so," Rainbow Dash shrugged.

Hogg winked. "Trust me, kid. He'd be a moron not to say yes to someone as striking as you."

"Thanks, I guess," Rainbow Dash said, trying to sound as reassured as she could.

Seemingly convinced, Hogg returned to the business at hand. "Now who did you say got a hold of these... _wacky_ pics and vids?"

"Hest Endetarm," Rainbow Dash answered. "He's this creepy Norwegian guy, very muscular, long black hair, screams at the top of his lungs for that band Bronycorpse..."

"Oh, _those_ guys!" Hogg affirmed. "Yeah, I know Bronycorpse. My son's a fan of theirs. I knew they were crazy, but I didn't know they were _that_crazy! Anyway, mind if I e-mail this to myself? We'll need it for evidence."

"Yeah, sure."

With that, Hogg promptly copied all of the racy pictures and videos, attached them onto another e-mail message, and sent that message to his own computer for evidence.

"Now it'll take some time to get an arrest warrant out," Hogg spoke in his most serious voice. "Likely, it won't be until this weekend. Just try not to provoke him into sending those pictures out; but if he does, you know who to call."

"Okay. Thanks, officer." Rainbow Dash walked out of the office to meet back up with Twilight in the lobby. She didn't notice that her memorabilia were still on Detective Hogg's computer screen, and that the detective himself had just unzipped his pants...

"So is Bore going through the files?" Rainbow Dash asked Twilight.

"Yeah. He said the warrant would be out by this weekend, and I told him to be at the Concert Hall on Saturday night with that warrant ready. So how'd it go on your end?"

"Hogg bought my story. He also told me that I should just ask Soarin' out already. And you know what? I think I will! I mean, he is pretty much obligated to say yes, right?"

Twilight shrugged. "Well, that's what society programs us to believe. But even if it wasn't like that," she added with a grin and a wink, "I just know that he'd still say yes all the same."

"Aww, thanks, Twilight!" Rainbow Dash smiled as she hugged her.

"No problem," Twilight grinned back.

So with that, all that was left on the two friends' respective agendas was the walk back home, homework, and hitting the sack. Celestia, Luna, and the C.P.D. were all now on board with their grand plan to defeat Hest. But starting tomorrow, there would be a much bigger hurdle for them and the rest of the band to overcome. They hadn't forgotten about the fact that they still had to rehearse for this upcoming Battle of the Bands. Even more pressing was Hest's forced condition of The Rainbooms playing black metal, lest they wanted disqualification. Granted, it would be most ideal to use Rainbow Dash's idea of fighting fire with fire.

Even so, Twilight didn't seem like the type of girl to pull off those menacing shrieks, Rainbow Dash certainly couldn't produce that heavily distorted guitar sound with the gear that she had, and Pinkie Pie probably didn't even know what a "blast beat" was. Even so, they knew that regardless of whether or not the police followed through with the warrant in time, they still had to try their absolute hardest to prevail, for the sake of The Rainbooms' pride and credibility as a band, as well as to save Flash from Hest's dark, corrupting, and maddening influence.


	11. Metallized

Now it was Tuesday afternoon at Canterlot High School. There were just five days, including today, left before the Battle of the Bands between Bronycorpse and The Rainbooms at Canterlot Concert Hall. It had become evident that not only had the Concert Hall agreed to hold this battle, but that the battle itself was something very much looked forward to by the other students at the school.

This might have been, in large part, because this battle was just the main event of the show, and not the whole thing; there would also be a musical showcase in which a menagerie of bands from the school would serve as the opening acts, giving them a great opportunity to strut their own stuff, as well as a more laid back type of entertainment for the other students before the much more serious battle took place.

All-in-all, things seemed to be going well for The Rainbooms. Thus far, throughout the day they'd gotten heaps of praise from other students school-wide, wishing them luck against the twisted, demonic black metal machine that was Bronycorpse. It wasn't until lunchtime that The Rainbooms, along with Sunset, got a moment to chat amongst themselves privately without getting barged in on.

"So the Principals got the show booked," Rarity said to Twilight.

"Yep," replied Twilight. "From what I understand, the whole school's gonna be at the Concert Hall this Saturday. A lot of opening acts and a lot of other students to see us defeat Bronycorpse!"

"Um, speaking of that," Fluttershy spoke up timidly, "the police are gonna be there to take Hest down... right?"

"Well, they did say that Saturday would be when they'd get the arrest warrant," Twilight explained. "Plus, I told that detective that they should go to the Concert Hall that night when they do get the warrant. So as far as I'm concerned, we're all set."

"YAY!" squealed Pinkie Pie. "We're gonna beat the bad guys and get the girls! WOO-HOO!"

"Uh, Pinkie," Applejack said flatly, "_we're_ the girls!"

Pinke blushed. "Oh."

"Actually, we're not gonna beat the bad guys with what we have," Rainbow Dash broke in, with a most urgent tone coloring her voice. "You're forgetting that we'll be disqualified from the battle unless we do black metal; so the only way to beat them will be to play black metal that's somehow better than theirs. Don't get me wrong, I'm still looking forward to beating them at their own game, and while I'm pretty sure most of us could hit the notes right, what about the sound? Did you even hear them when we saw them play last Friday?! Their guitars were so heavily distorted, and their drums were so brutally fast and heavy at the same time!

None of us are equipped to sound _anything_ like that! Suddenly, I'm not so sure if we can do it."

The other girls exchanged glances. This was not like Rainbow Dash at _all_; she was always so determined and confident. Now, she had backpedaled on that and was actually letting some pessimism show through. Surely this wasn't something they thought she'd ever let show through.

Sunset, however, was not fazed. "Hey, if you can hit the notes right, you should have no problem playing raw black metal," she grinned. "You just need some little, uh, 'additions' to your rigs, if you catch my drift." She winked.

"What kinda additions?" asked a curious and intrigued Applejack.

Sunset shrugged. "Well, I figured you wouldn't catch on right away, seeing as how you girls don't use guitar effects pedals or anything like that. All of the metal bands, including Bronycorpse, use these pedals in their guitar rigs to add that heavy distorted sound, amongst other things. But the distortion is all that's really needed for black metal... and the double bass pedal. You ever try your hand at a double bass pedal before, Pinkie?"

"Nah!" Pinkie shrugged. "I'd need a third foot to work the hi-hat cymbal."

"So just hit the hi-hat with your stick or use the ride cymbal," Sunset urged. "Because you're gonna need that double pedal in order to do those super-fast bass drum parts... and I'm pretty sure not even your feet are quick enough to do the job single-handedly."

"Uh-huh. And how are we supposed to get all of this stuff, exactly?" asked an unsure Twilight.

"Well, if I'm not mistaken, that music shop that Vinyl Scratch works at sells stuff for metalheads," Sunset explained. "I'll take you girls there after school today, and we can browse and hopefully get some good new metal gear for you. Whaddya say?"

The other girls looked at each other for a second of collective urgency. Though neither of them had bothered with these so-called effects and double bass pedals, as they seemed like more trouble than they were worth, what other choice did they have in this case? Sunset did, after all, seem like she knew what she was talking about, and they needed all the help they could get in order to change their sound from girly pop to blistering black metal.

So, seeing no alternative, they all nodded their heads.

"Great!" Sunset smiled, just as the bell rang. "And it sounds like class is about to start back up. See you girls after school!" And with that, she parted ways with The Rainbooms, for the time being...

* * *

><p>Later that afternoon, as the other students were boarding the school buses for their rides home, neither Twilight, Sunset nor the other Rainbooms got on board, for home was not their destination at the moment. Today, they were walking into town, to Vinyl Scratch's music shop, where maybe, just maybe, they would obtain the means to play the black metal that would bring Bronycorpse to their knees;<p>

It was a bit of a walk, but they eventually managed to arrive at the shop.

"Hey, it's The Rainbooms!" beamed Vinyl Scratch enthusiastically as she ran out from behind the cash register to greet them. "I've been hearing all about that battle you've got going on with that black metal band; the whole school's looking forward to it! I was actually kind of hoping you girls would show up; don't get me wrong, I think you'll do just fine, but I've been thinking you might need some help takin' on a real honest-to-God black metal band!"

"Actually, that's exactly why were here," Sunset said in the most serious tone she could muster. Getting close to Vinyl, she said rather inconspicuously, "Don't tell anyone else, but, uh, Bronycorpse's lead singer has imposed a stipulation for this battle that The Rainbooms have to do black metal also, or else be disqualified. I was hoping you'd have some distortion pedals and a double bass drum pedal that would help us get that sound?"

Needless to say, Vinyl was not expecting such a stipulation. Luckily, though, her shop was equipped with anything for any kind of music.

"Yeah, I have some of those," she said. "But I'm no metalhead, so I couldn't make any specific recommendations. You look metal enough to me to figure it out, though."

"Hopefully," Sunset replied with a sheepish chuckle. "Well, I guess we'll just browse then. Thanks."

Vinyl said nothing; she simply gave everyone a thumbs up as The Rainbooms all dispersed to various corners of the shop to browse through gear.

Sunset herself accompanied Rainbow Dash over to a long shelf on the wall towards the end of the shop, where the effects pedals were kept on display for potential customers. It turned out that Vinyl Scratch had a butt-load of different kinds of pedals stockpiled, most of which Rainbow Dash had never even heard of before, including wah-wah pedals, compressors, chorus effects, flangers, phasers, pitch shifters, reverb and delay pedals...

"Over here!" Sunset suddenly called out to Rainbow Dash. "I've found it!"

Eagerly, Rainbow Dash trotted a few feet over to where Sunset was, at which point Sunset showed her what she had found; the Boss ML-2 Metal Core distortion pedal. It was small, black and rectangular in shape, with the words "Metal Core" written in white on the footswitch at the bottom. On both sides were jacks labeled "Input" on the right and "Output" on the left, and on the top were four knobs, labeled, from left to right, "Level," "Low," "High," and "Dist."

"So you think that's gonna get me my black metal sound?" Rainbow Dash asked.

"Of course," Sunset assured her. "I know for a fact that Boss's Metal Zone pedal is by far the most popular distortion pedal amongst metal guitarists, but the Metal Core pedal is their most extreme! It should have no problem getting you that sound that's gonna have Bronycorpse shakin' in their boots!"

"Alright, I'll take it," Rainbow Dash said with approval.

"Oh mah God, Ah gotta get me this!"

Sunset and Rainbow Dash suddenly sped over to where Applejack was as soon as she made that aloud declaration.

"What have you gotta have?" Sunset asked.

"This, o' course!" Applejack grinned as she showed them what she was holding in her hand.

It was the Ibanez Bass Tube Screamer; an overdrive pedal for the bass guitar; something Applejack, and especially Rainbow Dash, would never have figured had effects pedals made for it. The Bass Tube Screamer was slightly larger, physically, than the Metal Core pedal. It was green, with a silver footswitch that had the word "Ibanez" engraved on it in blue. On the top were five knobs; a Drive knob on the upper-left, a Level knob on the upper-right, a Bass knob on the lower-left, a Treble knob on the lower-right, and a Mix knob in the middle.

"Oh, no way!" Rainbow Dash snarled as she snatched the Tube Screamer from Applejack's hand. "There's no way you should be messing around with these stupid pedals. You're just the bass player, remember?"

"Hey, Ah'm not gonna jus' let ya shut me outta the mix this time, partner!" Applejack snapped as she snatched the Tube Screamer right back. "Ah'm gonna be heard this time, whether ya like it or not!"

Rainbow Dash was certainly spoiling for a fight now, but Sunset, sensing this, quickly jumped in front of her before she could do anything rash.

"Just let her have the pedal," she urged. "This is for the good of the band, and for the sake of your battle with Bronycorpse. Besides, bass distortion is actually quite popular in metal, and I'm sure Bronycorpse uses it also, so you'd do well with it too!"

"Alright, fine," Rainbow Dash grudgingly conceded. "But only for the sake of the band!"

"Thanks a bunch, R.D.!"

Applejack and Rainbow Dash were about to hug when they suddenly heard a stream of low-end heavy beats sounding off at a rapid pace from an adjacent part of the store. Sunset, having a hunch, led Rainbow Dash and Applejack to the source of the sound, which was coming from where the drums were.

There, sitting at one of the pre-assembled drum kits, was Pinkie Pie, beating away on the bass drum at what sounded like a supersonic pace, using a double bass pedal just as Sunset suggested; a PDP 502, to be exact. She beat that bass drum pedal so hard and so fast with her feet that it looked like she was going to punch a hole in the bass drum at any moment.

"I... freaking... _love this pedal_!" Pinkie panted as she caught her breath.

"I think our work here is done," Sunset grinned.

With that, the entire gang regrouped and headed up to the counter, where they paid for Rainbow Dash's distortion pedal, Applejack's bass overdrive pedal, and Pinkie Pie's double bass drum pedal. Then they left the shop, eager to try out their new gear, with Vinyl Scratch wishing them the best of luck as they walked out...

* * *

><p>Some time after that, the girls all found themselves inside Rainbow Dash's garage; The Rainbooms's unofficial rehearsal space. Pinkie Pie had just swapped out her old single bass pedal and put her new double pedal in its place, Applejack had just hooked up her Bass Tube Screamer to her bass and to her Fender Rumble bass amp, and Rainbow Dash had just hooked up her Metal Core pedal to her guitar and to her Peavey Valveking II amp. In short, they were all raring to go.<p>

"Alright, Rainbow Dash," Sunset signaled. "Let's see what that thing can do!"

"With pleasure…" Rainbow Dash played a single E power chord. It was just one, simple chord, but with her new distortion pedal on, her guitar had a new, demonic scream added on to its sound, like a sinner being cut in half by a flaming buzzsaw.

"Oh, I'm diggin' this pedal already!" Rainbow Dash smirked. She then played a positively evil tremolo riff in the key of E, on the minor third scale, moving up from the E note to F# for a couple of bars, and then up to G for a couple more bars, and back down to F# for a bar, then back down to E for a bar, and then down to D for a few bars before playing the riff through once more.

Without effects pedals, said riffing surely would've sounded rather dry, but not with the Metal Core pedal in her rig.

"That... was the most evil thing I've ever heard from your guitar," Sunset mused. "It's _perfect!_ It's sure to make Bronycorpse shudder with fear!" She smirked after taking in all the satisfaction. "Now let's see what your Tube Screamer sounds like, Applejack."

With her Bass Tube Screamer engaged, Applejack played mostly the same riff Rainbow Dash played - a minor third riff in the key of E - except that it was plucked in half time. By itself, this bass line would've sounded ominous enough. But her newly acquired overdrive pedal added an unmistakably vicious growl to her sound, making her instrument sound like a cold-blooded monster whose stomach was hungry for the flesh of human carcasses.

"Ah, yes, that's textbook!" Sunset said with a sinister smile. "So heavy, it'll probably bring down the Concert Hall... plus, you might actually be heard!" Applejack couldn't help but grin at this remark, and Rainbow Dash, being the dominant instrumentalist, rolled her eyes in response.

"Ooh! Ooh! Me next! Me next!" Pinkie Pie squealed. Then, immediately after she said that, she tapped 1-2-3-4 on the hi-hat... and then, she let it all out. She went into an all-out assault on her drums, hammering rapid, machine gun-like low-end 16th notes on her bass drum with her new double bass pedal while at the same time hitting simultaneous 8th notes on the snare drum and the hi-hat cymbals. The result was a sound that wasn't as rhythmic as it was sonically violent, but for black metal, it had all the brutality the band would need.

As Pinkie continued to blast away on the drums, Sunset looked at Rainbow Dash and Applejack and said, "C'mon, play along!" And they did.

They both played the same ominous guitar and bass riffs they played before, and in perfect timing with Pinkie's drumming, as well. The result was something that one would've never before expected The Rainbooms to be capable of; pure, raw, unadulterated black metal that might've even impressed the old-school hardline black metallers from Norway.

After playing about 16 bars, Pinkie Pie, Applejack and Rainbow Dash all stopped, panting slightly to catch their breaths.

"That... was _amazing_!" Sunset commended them. "You actually did it... uh, I mean I knew you could do it. Bronycorpse will be begging you for mercy!"

Rainbow Dash, Applejack and Pinkie Pie couldn't help but blush a bit.

"Excuse me, Sunset," Rarity spoke up. "I'm in this band too, you know."

"Sorry, Rarity, I just… kinda got lost in the rhythm."

"That's alright, dear. Meanwhile, just last night I was experimenting with the sound palate on my keytar, and I think I've come up with something really, truly ghastly. Observe!"

Rarity then went on to play a series of long, minor chords on her keytar following the same general pattern as Rainbow Dash and Applejack, except she was playing in the key of B, which would form a perfect 5th harmony with their instruments. As it so happened, that ghastly sound she said she'd come up with was, in fact, that of a giant pipe organ from the old European cathedrals. Nothing alien about it at all, but still very eerie and foreboding nonetheless, leading her other bandmates, and Sunset, to give her thumbs-up.

"Um, well I think I'll just play my tambourine in the background," squeaked Fluttershy. "I, uh, don't wanna get hurt… or seem offensive, or anything."

"Hey, sis, don't worry," soothed Rainbow Dash, as she walked over to place a hand on her shoulder. "If Hest ever tries to come at you again, he'll have to go through me first."

"Fair enough," shrugged Sunset. "But now for the hard part; if you girls are really gonna do pure, raw black metal and beat Bronycorpse at their own game, then you, Twilight, need to do those gnarly black metal screams like what Hest does. That's one main ingredient we'll require; otherwise, we won't stand a chance against them."

"What are you nuts?!" Twilight protested. "I can't do those screams! I'll blow my throat out!"

"Fine! Be that way!" Sunset said. It was clear now that she would try and provoke her somehow. Then she had it. "Guess we'll be disqualified from the battle, and we won't be able to save Flash." She switched to her more romantic drama queen voice; one that might put Rarity to shame. "Oh, my poor Flashy! I'm really, truly gonna lose him forever... Never will I ever get the chance to kiss him again, to hold him, to make love to him..."

That last part was just too much for Twilight to brush off. With a growl, she lunged at Sunset with all of her might, grabbed a hold of her neck with one hand, and then screamed as only she could into the microphone she was holding with her other hand, "FLASH SENTRY IS MINE, DO YOU HEAR ME?! _MIIIIIIIIINE_!"

She threw Sunset to the ground, and then stopped herself to catch her breath, panting heavily. Sunset, however, was actually not deterred at all by Twilight's attack on her. In fact, she was happy. The way Twilight screamed at her was so ghastly, so gnarly, and so _powerful_. It was perfect! Just the kind of scream that would complete The Rainbooms's own black metal formula!

"Do that last part again, Twilight!" Sunset exclaimed as she stood back up.

"_MIIIIIIIIINE_!"

That was it. Sunset wasn't sure at first that she could, but Twilight had done it. With a little provocation, she had nailed that black metal scream!

"Yes! _Yes_! That's it!" Sunset cheered. "That's just the kind of sound we're looking for. That's how you need your black metal vocals to sound, right there. "Alright, now you do that scream one more time, and everyone else play along this time. C'mon! One, two, three, GO!"

Once again, Twilight screamed, "_MIIIIIIIIINE_!" as gnarly and powerfully as she could. And as she continued to belt out this scream, Pinkie Pie played her blast beats on the drums, Applejack plucked her E minor third riff on her bass, Rainbow Dash picked her E minor third riff on her guitar, Rarity played her B minor third pipe organ chords on her keytar, and Fluttershy tapped along on her tambourine in the background, keeping in half time with the drums;

Somehow, in some way, Twilight was able to keep up her screaming for a grand total of about thirteen seconds; a kind of power no one would've ever thought she had in her! And in that time, the rest of the band managed to squeeze in a total of 32 bars played, all in a 2/4 time signature. And as soon as they all stopped to catch their breath, they knew that they had all done it.

They had solved their black metal formula, they had found their black metal sound, and they all knew that now, they most certainly had a good shot at putting a certain other black metal band to shame.

"We did it, girls!" Sunset commended them all. "We're now a black metal band!"

As The Rainbooms all exchanged high-fives, Sunset then said in a more serious tone of voice, "But we still have a lot of work left ahead of us. We have to learn one or two, preferably two, complete songs for the battle this Saturday – I think that bit you all played just now might be the foundation for one of those songs. What do you think?"

"Definitely!" winked Rainbow Dash. "But we have time, and I'm so relieved that we've found our sound... I think I'm ready to take five. Who's up for some cupcakes and fruit punch?"

"YAY, CUPCAKES!" Pinkie Pie squealed as she dashed back into the house for some treats. And with grins all around, the rest of the girls all eagerly followed, all very much relieved to have overcome one major hurdle towards their upcoming ordeal, and now licking their chops for a moment of some much-needed refreshment...

* * *

><p>Meanwhile, over at the old abandoned garage – that is, Bronycorpse's rehearsal space - the music was just as tense as ever.<p>

_Deceit!  
>Intolerance!<br>Despair!  
>Malevolence!<br>Disgrace!  
>Black magic!<em>

BEHOLD THE ELEMENTS OF DISCORD!

And with one final bloodcurdling scream, Bronycorpse capped off their song "Elements of Discord." They had been rehearsing nonstop all afternoon, whacking away 110% on all of their material. They were all working really hard so that they might be at their best for their musical showdown with The Rainbooms, and none of them wanted it more than Hest did.

"So fars, I'd say wes all have dones excellents," he mused. "Buts always keep dis in minds; nevers be satsisfieds wit where yous currsentlys are. Always be strivsings to bes even betters in de futures dan yous are in de presents. We alls need to bes in as tops of a forms as wes can get tos in orders to defeat dose Rainbooms on Satsurdays. Ands we _will_ defeats dem! Yous all can quotes me ons dat!"

"Honestly," Flash broke in, "I just hope I'm still on good terms with them all after we're done. Even Sunny…"

"Huh?" Pervertor raised an eyebrow. "Sunny?"

"Sunny, as in... Sunset Shimmer?" Discordia chipped in.

"Um… yeah." There was no way Flash could deny it. He'd let it slip. Might as well face the teasing.

"Why would you, of all people, address her by that kind of a pet name, anyway?" Tartarus jabbed.

Flash suddenly began to sweat bullets as his bandmates all stared at him intently, eager to hear what he had to say for himself.

"W-w-well," he stammered. I... kinda, sorta, used to, uh... date Sunset. I broke up with her because she was just using me for social status, but she's reformed since then, and and I'd developed a… thing on Twilight. But now I'm thinking there's a chance I might want to get back with Sunset, and…" He paused, his face a deep shade of red. "She used to call me 'Flashy.'"

"_Flashy_? Really?" Hest burst out. "Dat's a laughs! Wow. Even today, she must sounds really pathetic. No _wonders_ you dumpsed her ins de firsts place."

There was something about that comment that set something off within Flash. Even he wasn't exactly sure what it was. But before he could contain his sudden spark of anger, he suddenly made a mad rush at Hest, backing him into the wall, almost impaling him on one of the many horned devil heads that adorned the walls of the garage.

"Listen, Hest!" he snapped. "Sunset may not be perfect, I know! But she's a hell of a lot closer to it than she was before - and yeah, I'd like to either get back with her or get with Twilight, but that's none of your business which one I choose! If you're smart, you'll never… _ever_ talk about Sunset that way again!"

Hest looked as though he had just been through an Olson Twins movie. He couldn't utter a sound. His face turned palely white. He was breaking a cold sweat.

"You understand me, pal?" barked Flash. "DO YOU?!"

"Alright, lay off, already!" Discordia pleaded as he yanked Flash away from Hest by the back of his leather jacket. "You've made your point, now calm down. The last thing we need is to be fighting amongst ourselves; that'll leave us in no condition for our battle with The Rainbooms.

"Yeah, you're right," acknowledged Flash as he caught his breath. "I'm sorry. But surely you guys would understand. You've all had girlfriends before... right?"

Pervertor, Tartarus and Discordia said nothing. They all just looked at each other for a second. Then, they all collectively hung their heads, with the most ashamed facial expressions that Flash had ever seen on another person's face.

It was Discordia who broke the silence. "There was this girl I dated once," he muttered. "The hottest chick I ever met. We were made for each other. And she dumped me for a sax player. I hate jazz…"

"I messed up real big with a girl from my science class," groaned Pervertor. "I was gonna ask her out during an assignment. One step on the slippery floor while holding dangerous chemicals and she spent a whole month in a biohazard isolation room…"

"I tried to impress this babe at the nearest nightclub," confessed Tartarus. "Wanted to get her attention. So I played my bass as loudly as I could while doing a song I wrote in her name. Maybe a little _too_ loud… Lucky thing I didn't get sued for giving her that hearing aid afterwards."

"Man," gasped Flash. "Sorry, guys. I… didn't know."

Hest, however, just rolled his eyes in apathy. "Excuse mes, I needs to gos vomit," he scoffed. "Now cans we please just get backs to business? I wanna wins dis battles, you knows!"

"Actually," Pervertor said as he turned off his amp, "I feel like throwing in the towel for today. We've been at it for, like, so long, my fingers and my back are getting stiff."

"Yeah, mine too," Tartarus noted as he turned off his bass amp, with Flash following suit with his own amp.

"Fine, whatevers," Hest shrugged. "But come straight backs here after schools is out tomorrows for rehearsals ASAP!"

"Alright," Flash said half-heartedly. He packed up his guitar, pocketed his pick, high-fived his bandmates and walked out of the abandoned garage, starting back for home.

All the while, his earlier outburst on Hest was swirling around in his mind. The way he freaked out when Hest spoke ill of Sunset made him start to wonder; between Sunset Shimmer and Twilight Sparkle, Flash still couldn't decide whom he should hook up with. But, as crazy as it might sound, maybe, just maybe, his heart had just made that decision for itself...

He was so lost in thought he didn't notice Hest watching him from a distance, his teeth clenched. His face distorted with quiet rage. His eyes filled with envy, wounded pride, and a desire for payback.


	12. The Show

For the next few days, The Rainbooms worked more seriously than they ever did before. Over time, they all grew into the new black metal sound that they'd managed to create, and eventually, managed to learn a complete black metal song that caught on to them. In short, things were going unexpectedly well for them, and they were in peak physical and musical condition to take on Bronycorpse.

Bronycorpse, meanwhile, were also working as hard as ever. Even though they'd already found their black metal sound and nailed all their own original material many times over without a single mistake, Hest pushed them all harder than he had ever done before. He was especially hard on Flash. To outsiders, this would be quite understandable, since Flash was the lead guitarist, after all. But ever since Flash's outburst last Monday, Hest had become noticeably less friendly towards him than he had been initially, leading Pervertor, Tartarus and Discordia to wonder whose fuse would detonate first...

* * *

><p>And then, before either band knew it, it was Saturday evening. It was the night of the Battle of the Bands at Canterlot Concert Hall, between Bronycorpse and The Rainbooms. Of all the bands scheduled to perform, The Rainbooms were the first to arrive at the venue. There was already loads of students from the school and their parents piling into the building, eager to see these two bands, and all of the other opening acts, in action. This, however, led to the ironic side effect of the front entrance being nearly impossible.<p>

But for The Rainbooms, this wasn't a problem. Rainbow Dash simply drove the van into a back alley behind the Concert Hall and parked it there; a perfect spot for getting around the dense crowds.

"This way, we'll be able to get our gear unloaded and onto the stage without people mobbing us," she affirmed. "It'll save security the trouble."

"We should get this done as soon as we possibly can," said Twilight, "before Bronycorpse comes in and decides to pull anything tricky on us. The cops should be on their way any minute now."

"Remember, girls," Sunset chipped in. "They still think Fluttershy is dead... at least, Hest does. I think it's best we don't spill the beans until we go onstage."

"But I don't want to face Hest again!" squeaked Fluttershy. "He looks like an angry orc ready to clobber me!"

"Don't worry about it, darling," Rarity assured her. "We'll keep you safe from him if anything does go wrong."

"Well we'd better get rollin', then!" exclaimed Pinkie Pie.

"Right-o!" replied Applejack.

The girls then all got up, opened the two back doors to their van, and with much effort and hard teamwork, unloaded Rainbow Dash's guitar, Applejack's bass, the individual pieces of Pinkie Pie's drum kit, Rarity's keytar, Fluttershy's tambourine, Rainbow Dash's amp, Applejack's bass amp and Rarity's Roland KC-550 keyboard amp. It then took them multiple trips to get the load into the building and onto the stage to be set up, but they all managed to get it done just in time for them to retreat to one of the backstage dressing rooms where they could all breathe easy, for the time being...

* * *

><p>Much later, the venue was totally packed and ready to go. All of the fans, students and parents alike, were in their seats. The stage was crowded with the instruments and amplifiers that were to be used by Bronycorpse and The Rainbooms, as well as all of the opening acts.<p>

Meanwhile, at the front and center of the crowd, sat a number of assorted family members and friends of The Rainbooms, including Big Macintosh, Soarin'—the boy whom Rainbow Dash's crush on was a big contributing factor to this event— and Flash Sentry's parents.

"I still don't like this," Flash's mom panicked. "I thought we told him that he shouldn't be playing in this devil band!"

"I don't like it either," replied Flash's dad, "but we gotta support our son nonetheless. Plus, Principal Celestia told us that Bronycorpse and all the other bands would be barred from doing any of those crazy theatrics, so this shouldn't be a repeat of what happened last time."

"I hope you're right, dear," replied his wife nervously. "We paid forty bucks for this."

"Cheaper than the usual price around this joint."

The crowd immediately fell silent. At the front and center of the stage were Principal Celestia and Vice Principal Luna.

"Welcome, one and all, to Canterlot High School's Musical Showcase/Battle of the Bands!" Celestia announced.

After the resulting applause died down, Luna spoke up. "This is where two of Canterlot High's most prominent musical acts—the fabulous pop girl group The Rainbooms, and the vicious black metal band Bronycorpse—will settle their differences once and for all. Of course, when we were first pitched this idea, I was reminded of our last Battle of the Bands, and how it was conceived originally from a musical showcase. So my sister and I thought, why not combine the two into one event? These two bands might achieve closure, and the other students are getting involved without getting involved, if that makes any sense..."

"Anyway," Celestia broke in. "Give it up, everyone, for our first opening act; the Cutie Mark Crusaders!"

The crowd then applauded as the stage was taken over by Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo. The applause quickly grew into loud cheers and cat-calling from the men and boys in the audience when they noticed that the Crusaders were all in bikinis; Apple Bloom had on a black bikini with white stars, along with a black bandanna with white skulls, and her hair was hanging loose, as opposed to the ponytails and bows she normally wore; Scootaloo was clad in a purple bikini with blue and purple stripes; and Sweetie Belle was sporting a pink bikini with light green stripes. Her hair was hanging loose like Apple Bloom's, only hers was down past her waist and was done in a very rough rocker-type style, plus she had pink makeup around her left-eye to compliment her bikini.

As for their actual performance, it was very short, but very sweet; the males in the audience could certainly attest to that statement! They came up with one familiar song: "Hex Girls" from the movie _Scooby-Doo and the Witch's Ghost_. They didn't play their own instruments; rather, they had the music playing on the speakers while they sang and danced in unison. Sweetie Belle was allowed to be the main singer of the group; no girl could be just as talented as she was.

This really got the crowd, especially the boys around the girls' age, focused on them. Pipsqueak, a slightly shorter foreign exchange student from Trottingham, couldn't help being entranced by the lovable Sweetie Belle. Featherweight, the buck-toothed photographer of the C.H.S.'s newspaper, trained his camera on Apple Bloom almost entirely throughout the song. Rumble, little brother of Wondercolts player Thunderlane, imagined Scootaloo winking at him.

As they sang, the girls did the most challenging dance moves they could think of, ranging from Elvis-style pelvic thrusts and gyrations, all the way up to modern-day styles like twerking. It was tough, but they managed through practice. During the final chorus, they even grinded against one another. Most of the audience cheered wildly. Watching from backstage, however, Celestia and Luna started to ponder over the effects of pop culture on young girls. Rarity, Applejack and Rainbow Dash just shook their heads, knowing that this lifestyle was not what they wanted their younger sisters to lead.

When the song was over, Apple Bloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle took their bows and blew kisses at the cheering men in the audience as they retreated backstage. Many other opening acts followed them, but none of them were as "engaging" as the Crusaders.

Snips and Snails, wannabe rappers, did a hip-hop duet that resulted in the audience booing harshly. Lyra Heartstrings and Sweetie Drops played a duet on the harp and piano that left everyone soothingly mesmerized. Photo Finish and her band, the Snapshots, did some entertaining geek rock that managed to bring the inner nerd out of even the biggest jocks in the crowd. Bulk Biceps, normally a big, tough jock himself, pleasantly surprised everyone by letting his softer side show through a soothing piece on the violin. Vinyl Scratch, using her stagename DJ Pon-3, broke out her turntables and blasted some powerful hardcore techno and dubstep that made everyone want to get up and dance like how the Crusaders were dancing when they were on stage. The self-proclaimed "Great and Powerful" Trixie, along with her band The Illusions, finished off the opening musical showcase with their signature song; the electronic/rock hybrid hit "Tricks Up My Sleeve."

Once Trixie and the Illusions finished up their piece and took their gear backstage, Celestia and Luna got back onstage.

"Are you ready for the main event, the Battle of the Bands?!" asked Celestia.

The crowd responded with a chorus of loud, excited cheers.

"Great!" replied Luna. "Now brace yourselves; first up is the most extreme band to ever set foot at our school. So extreme that Celestia and I had to pull the plug on them when they played there! Give it up for... BRONYCORPSE!"

The crowd applauded as Hest, Pervertor, Tartarus, Discordia and Flash slowly, ominously made their way onto the stage. All of them were wearing the black-and-white corpse paint on their faces that was the staple of the black metal look. Hest, Pervertor, Tartarus and Discordia were all sporting spiked gauntlets on their forearms and bullet belts on their waists, and neither of them were wearing shirts, instead preferring to show off their very prominent muscles on their upper bodies, earning some cat-calls from the females in the audience. Flash, meanwhile, just stuck with his regular old black leather jacket.

Almost casually, Discordia sat down at his massive drum kit, while Pervertor and Flash picked up their guitars and Tartarus picked up his bass. As Hest went up to the mic, Flash, Pervertor and Tartarus started out with a single sustained A note...

The audience jumped in shock, some of them genuinely frightened, as they got their song started. The song they opened with was "Black Metal ist Krieg," as made famous by the German black metal band Nargaroth. The first half of the song consisted of Discordia furiously blasting away almost constantly on the drums, with the occasional fill thrown in, while Flash, Pervertor and Tartarus played an ominous tremolo-picked harmonic minor-third riff in the key of E.

All the while, Hest screamed these words…

_Black Metal ist Krieg!  
>Black Metal ist Krieg!<br>Black fucking Metal ist Krieg!_

_Black..._  
><em>Black Metal ist Krieg!<em>  
><em>Black fucking Metal ist Krieg!<em>  
><em>Black Metal ist Krieg!<em>

_Black..._  
><em>Black Metal ist Krieg!<em>  
><em>Ihr Wichser, es ist Krieg!<em>  
><em>Black Metal!<em>

_Black..._  
><em>Black Metal ist Krieg!<em>  
><em>Black Metal ist Krieg!<em>  
><em>Black...<em>

_Black..._  
><em>Black Metal ist Krieg!<em>  
><em>Fuck, Metal ist Krieg!<em>  
><em>Black Metal!<em>

_Black..._  
><em>Black Metal ist Krieg!<em>  
><em>Black fucking Metal ist Krieg!<em>  
><em>Black Metal ist Krieg!<em>

_Krieg..._  
><em>Ihr Wichser, es ist Krieg!<em>  
><em>Black Metal ist Krieg!<em>  
><em>Ihr Wichser...<em>  
><em>Krieg...<em>

_Krieg..._  
><em>Black Metal ist Krieg!<em>  
><em>Black fucking Metal ist Krieg!<em>

_Krieg..._  
><em>Fuck you!<em>  
><em>Krieg, es ist Krieg!<em>

_Black Metal ist Krieg!_

_Krieg..._  
><em>Ihr Wichser, Krieg!<em>  
><em>Es ist Krieg!<em>

_Black Metal ist Krieg …_

The second half of the song was more mid-paced, but even more chilling. As Discordia played a more rock n' roll-type beat, with the occasional double-bass kick thrown in, Flash, Pervertor and Tartarus played a riff that went from high E, down to low A, up to high D, then up to E, all in conjunction with minor chords and arpeggios in between and throughout that were so grim, chilling and ominous that the audience all literally got goosebumps. To them, it literally felt like it had just gotten colder inside the venue, even though no one had tampered with the thermostat; that was just how grim and frostbitten they managed to sound.

Hest, meanwhile, screamed indistinctly now and then as the rest of the band played on, and also took the opportunity to drink some water now and then in between measures. Even his vocal cords weren't exactly invincible.

However, that was where the real exclamation mark of the song came into play.

Before everyone knew it, the song came to its end, but it was a powerful one indeed. As Flash, Pervertor and Tartarus all played one, long, final sustained E note to cap it all off, Hest went over to Flash and held the microphone up near his mouth, at which point Flash, almost without thinking, yelled in an incredibly raspy, black metal-like tone that he never thought he could pull off.

_"CANTERLOT IST KRIEG!"_

This brought the crowd into a raucous applause as the sound from the guitars died off. The audience continued to cheer as Hest, Pervertor, Tartarus and Discordia all posed arrogantly before the crowd, flexing their massive muscles, while Flash just casually gave the sign of the horns and smiled.

When the cheering and applause started to die down, Bronycorpse retreated backstage, all satisfied with their performance, especially Hest.

"De Rainsboom will nevers be ables to tops dat!" he cackled to himself. "Dey'll either bes disqualsifieds or blow dere throat outs and chafs dere finger offs, and we'll wins by defaults! It perfects…"

"I dunno what you're saying, Hest," said an eavesdropping Tartarus, two fingers pinching his nose, "but I know you could use a breath mint."

"Alright, this is it, girls," Rainbow Dash said to her bandmates as Celestia and Luna addressed the crowd. "This is what we've been training for, right here! We're gonna do black metal so cold, so dark and grim, that Bronycorpse will be pleading for mercy! When the crowd goes crazy for us more than they were for those chumps, we'll win for sure! Now who's with me?!"

"_We are_!" cheered the rest.

"And now," proclaimed Celestia, "put your hands together for our school's biggest breakout popular hit group... THE RAINBOOMS!"

That was their cue. Twilight went up to the front and center stage where the microphone was, while Rainbow Dash walked up near the front with her guitar, Applejack with her bass, and Rarity with her keytar. Pinkie Pie sat down at her drum kit and Fluttershy stood back by the drums with her  
>tambourine in hand. As the crowd watched with bated breath, Pinkie tapped one-two-three-four on the hi-hats, and then their song started.<p>

It was called "A Sovereign Fortress," originally performed by an old Norwegian black metal band called Antestor. That band had been strongly hated by the broader black metal scene because they practiced something that all those other bands stood against; Christianity. Antestor were a Christian black metal band, something that other black metal bands saw as blasphemy, and likewise something that The Rainbooms thought would be the perfect slap in the face to Bronycorpse, especially the radical, fanatic and maniacal Hest Endetarm.

The song started with Rainbow Dash and Applejack playing a riff in the key of D minor, that went from D, down to B-flat, down to G, up to A, and then back up to D again. They played this riff through for four measures; starting on the third measure, Pinkie Pie beat out a six-eighths beat on the drums, Rarity played some dark, cold ambient background noises on her keytar, while Fluttershy quietly tapped her tambourine along with Pinkie's drums in the background.

Then, for the next eight measures, Rainbow Dash and Applejack played in the key of A minor, moving from A, down to F, down to E and then back to A again. Pinkie Pie continued her six-eights beat on the drums while adding in double-kicks on her bass drum. Rarity kept up with her cold, ambient sounds on her keytar, Fluttershy kept tapping along on her tambourine, and Twilight, in a harsh, raspy screech that no one would've ever thought she could hope to achieve, belted out the beginning lyrics;

_In You, I Have Taken Refuge  
>Never Let Me Be Put To Shame<br>As You Are Righteous Rescue Me And Save My Life  
>Hear Me And Set Me Free<br>Be A Rock Of Refuge For Me,  
>Where I May Ever Find Safety At Your Call<br>For You Are My Towering Crag And Stronghold  
>O Lord, Keep My Life Safe From The Wicked<em>

As she sang those words, she reached up to the sky with her right hand, as if she were reaching out to God Himself. Already moved by the band's performance so far, the audience did the same. And as Bronycorpse was watching from the closed circuit TV screen in their backstage dressing room, Hest was outraged. Not only were The Rainbooms actually performing real black metal, but they were worshipping God, not Satan. To him, there was no greater blasphemy…

Twilight smirked. She had planned on using Rainbow Dash's suggestion of a song the minute she read the music.

Meanwhile, The Rainbooms played on. The song suddenly slowed down considerably, with Pinkie plodding along on her drums almost at the pace of a funeral march. Rainbow Dash and Applejack remained in the key of A minor, starting in D, then up to E, and then up to A before starting the riff over again. And as Rarity and Fluttershy plodded along on their instruments, Twilight, still in her God-worshipping pose, kept on shrieking.

_You Are My Hope, O Lord, My Trust, O Lord, Since Girlhood  
>From Birth I Have Leaned Upon You<br>My Protector Since I Left My Mother's Womb_

The song then went into one of black metal's signature trademarks; blast beats. Pinkie Pie broke out into a furious blast beat, still in the six-eighths time signature. Rainbow Dash and Applejack played along in the key of D minor, going from D, up to E, down to C then back up to D again. They played that through a couple of times, then went down to B flat, then down to A, before starting the riff over again, with keytar and tambourine still playing along in the background... then the song abruptly went back to its earlier six-eighths A minor segment from the first verse.

Twilight, now once again reaching up to the heavens, screeched these words;

_Let All My Traducers Be Shamed And Dishonored  
>Let All Who Seek My Hurt Be Covered With Scorn<br>But I Will Wait In Continual Hope  
>I Will Praise You Again And Again<br>All Day Long Your Righteousness, Your Saving Acts,  
>Shall Be Upon My Lips<br>You Shall Ever Be The Theme Of My Praise  
>Your Righteousness, Yours Alone<em>

Then they once again played their really slow and doomy piece, with Twilight once again screaming;

_You Are My Hope, O Lord, My Trust, O Lord, Since Girlhood  
>From Birth I Have Leaned Upon You<br>My Protector Since I Left My Mother's Womb_

The song then went back to the blast beats, playing that segment over again for four measures. Then, it went right back to its opening riff, this time with Pinkie Pie playing along in a slow four-fourths beat. She played like this for two measures before switching to a six-eighths beat while the guitar, bass and keytar kept playing their D minor riff.

At the same time, Twilight screamed these words up to the heavens;

_For You Have Done Great Things  
>Who Is Like You?<em>

With one final shriek of "O LORD!" the song ended abruptly. As cold and dark as it sounded, the song was also very uplifting for the audience; uplifting enough for them to reap massive amounts of applause upon The Rainbooms, who humbly took their bows, satisfied with their own performance, and more confident than ever that they'd beat Bronycorpse.

Bronycorpse themselves emerged from backstage to join The Rainbooms on stage once the cheers died down; it would now be time for the audience to judge which band won this battle. Both bands stood facing the crowd, trying like hell not to look at each other, but none put up a greater effort on that regard than Hest.

"Hows in helvete dids they pull dats off!" he seethed. "Black metal is _ours_ ting! Hell, deys even brought dat Fluttershy chick back from the dead?! None of my pacts with de Devil dids anything closes to dat!"

"Dude," began Pervertor in a straight monotone, "zip it."

In the meantime, the mood throughout the venue as a whole was more upbeat as Celestia took the microphone once again. "Well, I think we can all agree that those were both top-notch black metal performances that would make Norway proud," she said, with the audience applauding in response.  
>"Unfortunately," Luna broke in, "only one can come out above the other one here. And there's only one way to decide that outcome. If you think Bronycorpse is the winner, make some noise!"<p>

On cue, loud cheers erupted from the crowd. Hest, Pervertor, Tartarus and Discordia all arrogantly flashed their muscles for the fans as they cheered while Flash simply smiled and waved.

"If you think The Rainbooms are the winners, make some noise!"

The Rainbooms all bowed as cheers came from the crowd; cheers that were just noticeably louder than those Bronycorpse received. Flash just shrugged it off; he wasn't looking to win, so much as to have fun, after all, which he did achieve, so all-in-all, he was satisfied nonetheless. If anything, he should be glad that his friends were getting this much applause. But Hest, Pervertor, Tartarus and Discordia hardly even noticed. They were all still certain that a large majority of the crowd had voted for them.

As Flash began to turn his head toward The Rainbooms' direction, he suddenly remembered seeing a flicker of gold and crimson to his right a few seconds ago. He looked back and found Sunset standing backstage, giving him a tiny, warm, encouraging smile. Nervously, Flash lifted his right hand and waved in her direction. Sunset's face instantly flushed.

Now Flash understood what came over him when he tacked Hest. It was like grade school all over again. Back when Flash and Sunset first met. Back when she was so helpless and he had to be the one to rescue her…

His focus was broken as Celestia and Luna took the mic one more time. "We have a winner," they declared in unison. "THE RAINBOOMS!"


End file.
